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Dais Miller

tional Episode

BY HENRY JAMES, JR., ILLUS-
TRATED FROM DRAWINGS BY
HARRY W. McVICKAR

HARPER & BROTHERS

NEW YORK MDCCCXCH

/til rights reserved.

DAISY MILLER.

PAGE

Frontispiece . » . » • •

Heading. Part I •

Little Polish Boy

Winterbourne . »

French Waiter 12

"If you eat three lumps" . . . . t. . .16

Randolph and his Alpenstock ... . . . . 21

On the Lake . . . •"...'• V. • • • • 25

Randolph alone . . . .". . ' ' • • • ' » • 28

Alpenstock . . . . • • . . - . .31

Papa Miller! . . . ..- . ' . . * . -36

Hotels Daisy stopped at . . . .

Geneva . . • . . • . . . ." . . • 45

Chillon . . . . " . ... . . 48

Old Castles . . ' . ' . . . . . . 51, 53, 54

At the Boat-landing . ... . . .57

Crest of Switzerland .59

Finis. Part 1 61

Heading. Part II. Rome 63

One of Mrs. Walker's Guests 66

Violin 68

Winterbourne's Idea of Daisy Miller 71

"The best place we saw is the City of Richmond " . .74
Decoration . . . . ... . . . .76

Mr. Giovanelli . . . . . . . . .79

The Pope's Arms . . ... • . . . . 81

A Corner in Rome . . . . . . . . 84

A Quill-driver's Tools . . . . . . , . 87

Tubes . . ..... ... . . . . . . 90

Mrs. Walker . 93

PAGE

Rood-screen in Old Church 97

The Flag of Italy . ...... ! 100

An Incense-burner m jQ3

Decoration (Cardinal's Hat) ... ! 106

Mrs. Costello *. ' 109

A Bit of a Roman Garden .111

Arch of Constantino 115

Decoration ! 119

Colosseum (the Deadly Miasma!) . . . ! 122

Eugenic ./..-. [ 125

Requiem ".''.... .' 127

Daisy's Grave .131

AN INTERNATIONAL EPISODE.

Frontispiece . . . ... ... .135

Tug- boats f '. 137

A Bit of the Battery ! 139

New York Docks .142

Percy Beaumont. . . ... . . .- ..145

Letter of Introduction . 147

Lessons in American -. . 149

Types they met Down-town . . . . .... 152

Corner of Greenwich Street . . .• . . . ... . 154.

Weather-vane of Church-steeple . . . . , . 155

Mr.Westgate 156

View from Westgate's Office . . .... 159

Fall River Steamboat-landing 152

Impressions ... . " .164

Bookishness of Boston . . . ^ . . ... 165
On the Newport Boat . . . . - •. . . 157

Waiters at the Ocean House . . . . . 168, 169

Mrs. Westgate . . '171

A Guest of Mrs. Westgate . . . » . V . .175
The Web Lambeth is Warned Against .... 178

English Hats 180

The American Flag 182

The Pretty Sister of Mrs. Westgate iS5

Money 189

Newport Rocks . 192

A Bit of Newport Farm-land 195

Mrs. Westgate's Trap 200

Thames Street 203

Two Pretty Girls 205

PAGE

Marquis and Duke's Crown . . - . . .207

Decoration . . . . . . . . 212

Heading. Part IT. . . . . .217

Duke of Green-Erin . ... . . .220

Willie Woodley . .- /. . . . .•"•.'. . 227

Decoration . . . . . . . . . . 229

The Duchess's Invitation . . ..... .234

Bessie Alden . . . . ^ ' . . 237

In Hyde Park . .- . . . . . . " . 239

The Duke . . 243

Parliament Buildings ... ,~ .... 247

The Gate - . . . 252

Duchess of Suffolk and Lord Chamberlain . ... 255

Decoration . . . .- . . . ..... 259

Not Such a Fool as He Looks . . . . .263

Decorations 267, 273, 279

The Duchess's Cards . .283

••Mrs. Westgate glanced at the clock " ' . .' . .284
Bessie is Fond of Travelling . - i . . .285

The Duchess . . ' 287

Journal . .... • • . . . . . . 289

The Branches . . . .', - . . ."' .291

Writing . . . • . . . . . -. . .293

Decoration . . . . . . „ . . . 295

Finis .....'... .296

T the little town of Yevay, in
Switzerland, there is a particular-
ly comfortable hotel. There
are, indeed, many hotels ; for
the entertainment of tourists
the business of the place,
which, as many travellers will
remember, is seated upon the edge of
a remarkably blue lake — a lake that it
behooves every tourist to visit. The
shore of the lake presents an unbroken
array of establishments of this order,
of every category, from the "grand ho-
tel" of the newest fashion, with a chalk-
white front, a hundred balconies, and a

dozen flags flying from its roof, to the
little Swiss pension of an elder day, with
its name inscribed in German -looking
lettering upon a pink or yellow wall, and
an awkward summer-house in the angle
of the garden. One of the hotels at Ye-
vay, however, is famous, even classical,
being distinguished from many of its up-
start neighbors by an air both of luxury
and of maturity. In this region, in the
month of June, American travellers are
extremely numerous ; it may be said, in-
deed, that Yevay assumes at this period
some of the characteristics of an Ameri-
can watering-place. There are sights and
sounds which evoke a vision, an echo, of
Newport and Saratoga. There is a flit-
ting hither and thither of " stylish" young
girls, a rustling of muslin flounces, a rat-
tle of dance-music in the morning hours,
a sound of high-pitched voices at all times.
You receive an impression of these things
at the excellent inn of the Trois Cou-
ronnes, and are transported in fancy to
the Ocean House or to Congress Hall.
But at the Trois Couronnes, it must be
added, there are other features that are
much at variance with these suggestions :
neat German waiters, who look like sec-

retaries of legation j ^ Russian

princesses sitting in the garden ; little
Polish boys walking about, held by the
hand, with their governors ; a view of
the sunny crest of the Dent da Midi
and the picturesque tow-
ers of the Castle of Chil- ^
Ion.

I hardly know whether
it was the analogies or the
differences that were uppermost in the
mind of a young American, who, two or
three years ago, sat in the garden of the
Trois Couronnes, looking about him, rath-
er idly, at some of the graceful objects I
have mentioned. It was a beautiful sum-
mer morning, and in whatever fashion
the young American looked at things
they must have seemed to him charming.
He had come from Geneva the day be-
fore by the little steamer to see his aunt,
who was staying at the hotel — Geneva
having been for a long time his place of
residence. But his aunt had a headache
— his aunt
had almost
always a
headache —
and now she

was shut up in her room, smelling cam-
phor, so that he was at liberty to wander
about. He was some seven-and-twenty
years of age. When his friends spoke of
him, they usually said that he was at
Geneva "studying;" when his enemies
spoke of him, they said — but, after all, he
had no enemies ; he was an extremely
amiable fellow, and universally liked.
What I should say is, simply, that when
certain persons spoke of him they affirm-
ed that the reason of his spending so
much time at Geneva was that he was
extremely devoted to a lady who lived
there — a foreign lady — a person older
than himself. Very few Americans — in-
deed, I think none — had ever seen this
lady, about whom there were some sin-
gular stories. But Winterbourne had an
old attachment for the little metropolis
of Calvinism ; he had been put to school
there as a boy, and he had afterwards
gone to college there — circumstances
which had led to his forming a great many
youthful friendships. Many of these he
had kept, and they were a source of great
satisfaction to him.

After knocking at his aunt's door, and
learning that she was indisposed, he had

taken a walk about the town, and then
lie had come in to his breakfast. He had
now finished his breakfast ; but he was
drinking a small cup of coffee, which had
been served to him on a little table in
the garden by one of the waiters who
looked like an attache. At last he fin-
ished his coffee and lit a cigarette. Pres-
ently a small boy came walking along
the path — an urchin of nine or ten. The
child, who was diminutive for his years,
had an aged expression of countenance:
a pale complexion, and sharp little feat-
ures. He was dressed in knickerbockers,
with red stockings, which displayed his
poor little spindle-shanks ; he also wore a
brilliant red cravat. He carried in his
hand a long alpenstock, the sharp point
of which he thrust into everything that
he approached — the flower- beds, the gar-
den-benches, the trains of the ladies'
dresses. In front of Winterbourne he
paused, looking at him with a pair of
bright, penetrating little eyes.

" Will you give me a lump of sugar ?"
he asked, in a sharp, hard little voice — a
voice immature, and yet, somehow, not
young.

Winterbourne glanced at the small ta-

ble near him, on which his coffee-service
rested, and saw that several morsels of
sugar remained. "Yes, you may take
one," he answered ; " but I don't think
sugar is good for little boys."

This little boy stepped forward and
carefully selected three of the coveted
fragments, two of which he buried in
the pocket of his knickerbockers, depos-
iting the other as promptly in another
place. He poked his alpenstock, lance-
fashion, into Winterbourne's bench, and
tried to crack the lump of sugar with his
teeth.

" Oh, blazes ; it's har-r-d !" he exclaim-
ed, pronouncing the adjective in a pecul-
iar manner.

Winterbourne had immediately per-
ceived that he might have the honor of
claiming him as a fellow-countryman.
"Take care you don't hurt your teeth,"
he said, paternally.

"I haven't got any teeth to hurt.
They have all come out. I have only
got seven teeth. My mother counted
them last night, and one came out right
afterwards. She said she'd slap me if
any more came out. I can't help it. It's
this old Europe. It's the climate that

makes them
come out. In
America they
didn't come
out. It's these
hotels."

Winterbourne was much amused. "If
you eat three lumps of sugar, your moth-
er will certainly slap you," he said.
" She's got to give me some candy,

then," rejoined his young interlocutor.
" I can't get any candy here — any Amer-
ican candy. American candy 's the best
candy."

" And are American little boys the
best little boys?" asked Wioterbourne.

"I don't know. I'm an American
boy," said the child.

" I see you are one of the best !"
laughed Winterbourne.

" Are you an American man ?" pur-
sued this vivacious infant. And then,
on Winterbourne's affirmative reply—
" American men are the best !" he de-
clared.

His companion thanked him for the
compliment ; and the child, who had
now got astride of his alpenstock, stood
looking about him, while he attacked a
second lump of sugar. Winterbourne
wondered if he himself had been like
this in his infancy, for he had been
brought to Europe at about this age.

"Here comes my sister!" cried the
child, in a moment. "She's an Ameri-
can girl."

Winterbourne looked along the path
and saw a beautiful young lady advanc-
ing. " American girls are the best girls !"
10

he said, cheerfully, to his young com-
panion.

" My sister ain't the best !" the child
declared. " She's always blowing at me."

" I imagine that is your fault, not
hers," said Winterbourne. The young
lady meanwhile had drawn near. She
was dressed in white muslin, with a hun-
dred frills and flounces, and knots of
pale-colored ribbon. She was barehead-
ed ; but she balanced in her hand a large
parasol, with a deep border of embroid-
ery; and she was strikingly, admirably
pretty. " How pretty they are !" thought
Winterbourne, straightening himself in
his seat, as if he were prepared to rise.

The young lady paused in front of his
bench, near the parapet of the garden,
which overlooked the lake. The little
boy had now converted his alpenstock
into a vaulting-pole, by the aid of which
he was springing about in the gravel, and
kicking it up a little.

"Kandolph," said the young lady,
" what are you doing ?"

" I'm going up the Alps," replied Ran-
dolph. "This is the way!" And he
gave another little jump, scattering the

pebbles about Winterbourne's ears.
11

"That's the way they come down,"
said Winterbourne.

" He's an American man !" cried Ran-
dolph, in his little hard voice.

The young lady gave no heed
to this announcement, but looked
straight at her brother. "Well, I
guess you had better be quiet," she
simply observed.

It seemed to Winterbourne
that he had been in a manner
presented. He got up and
^ stepped slowly towards, the
|f young girl, throwing away his
cigarette. " This little boy and
I have made acquaintance," he said,
with great civility. In Geneva, as
he had been perfectly aware, a young
man was not at liberty to speak to a
young unmarried lady except under cer-
tain rarely occurring conditions ; but here
at Vevay, what conditions could be bet-
ter than these? — a pretty American girl
coming and standing in front of you in
a garden. This pretty American girl,
however, on hearing Winterbourne's ob-
servation, simply glanc-
ed at him ; she then
turned her head and

looked over the parapet, at the lake and
the opposite mountains. He wondered
whether he had gone too far ; but he de-
cided that he must advance farther, rath-
er than retreat. While he was thinking
of something else to say, the young lady
turned to the little boy again.

" I should like to know where you got
that pole ?" she said.

" I bought it," responded Randolph.

"You don't mean to say you're going
to take it to Italy ?"

" Yes, I am going to take it to Italy,"
the child declared.

The young girl glanced over the front
of her dress, and smoothed out a knot or
two of ribbon. Then she rested her eyes
upon the prospect again. " Well, I guess
you had better leave it somewhere," she
said, after a moment.

" Are you going to Italy ?" Winter-
bourne inquired, in a tone of great re-
spect.

The young lady glanced at him again.
"Yes, sir," she replied. And she said
nothing more.

"Are you — a — going over the Sim-
plon ?" Winterbourne pursued, a little
embarrassed.

" I don't know," she said. " I suppose
it's some mountain. Randolph, what
mountain are we going over ?"

" Going where ?" the child demanded.

" To Italy," Winterbourne explained.

"I don't know," said Randolph. "I
don't want to go to Italy. I want to go
to America."

" Oh, Italy is a beautiful place !" re-
joined the young man.

" Can you get candy there ?" Randolph
loudly inquired.

" I hope not," said his sister. " I guess
you have had enough candy, and mother
thinks so, too."

" I haven't had any for ever so long—
for a hundred weeks !" cried the boy,
still jumping about.

The young lady inspected her flounces
and smoothed her ribbons again, and
Winterbourne presently risked an obser-
vation upon the beauty of the view, lie
was ceasing to be embarrassed, for he had
begun to perceive that she was not in
the least embarrassed herself. There had
not been the slightest alteration in her
charming complexion ; she was evidently
neither offended nor fluttered. If she
looked another way when he spoke to

her, and seemed not particularly to hear
him, this was simply her habit, her man-
ner. Yet, as he talked a little more, and
pointed out some of the objects of in-
terest in the view, with which she appear-
ed quite unacquainted, she gradually gave
him more of the benefit of her glance;
and then he saw that this glance was
perfectly direct and unshrinking. It
was not, however, what would have been
called an immodest glance, for the young
girl's eyes were singularly honest and
fresh. They were wonderfully pretty
eyes ; and, indeed, Winterbourne had not
seen for a long time anything prettier
than his fair countrywoman's various
features — her complexion, her nose, her
ears, her teeth. He had a great relish for
feminine beauty ; he was addicted to ob-
serving and analyzing it ; and as regards
this young lady's face he made several ob-
servations. It was not at all insipid, but it
was not exactly expressive; and though
it was eminently delicate, Winterbourne
mentally accused it — very forgivingly —
of a want of finish. He thought it very
possible that Master Randolph's sister was
a coquette ; he was sure she had a spirit
of her own ; but in her bright, sweet,

superficial little visage there was no mock-
ery, no irony. Before long it became ob-
vious that she was much disposed towards
conversation. She told him that they
were going to Rome for the winter —
she and her mother and Ran-
dolph. She asked him if he was
a " real American ;" she shouldn't
have taken him for one ; he seem-
ed more like a German — this was
said after a little hesitation
— especially when
he spoke. Winter-
bourne, laughing,
answered that he
had met Ger-

m a n s WT h o
but that he had
remember-

spoke like Americans
not, so far as he
ed, met an Amer- >
ican who spoke
like a German.
Then he asked her if she
should not be more comfort-
able in sitting upon the bench which
he had just quitted. She answered
that she liked standing up and walk-
ing about; but she presently sat down.
She told him she was from New York

State — " if you know where that is."
Winterbourne learned more about her
by catching hold of her small, slippery
brother, and making him stand a few
minutes by his side.

" Tell me your name, my boy," he said.

" Kandolph C. Miller," said the boy,
sharply. " And I'll tell you her name ;"
and he levelled his alpenstock at his sister.

" You had better wait till you are ask-
ed !" said this young lady, calmly.

" I should like very much to know
your name," said Winterbourne.

" Her name is Daisy Miller !" cried the
child. " But that isn't her real name ;
that isn't her name on her cards."

"It's a pity you haven't got one of my
cards !" said Miss Miller.

" Her real name is Annie P. Miller,"
the boy went on.

"Ask him his name," said his sister,
indicating Winterbourne.

But on this point Randolph seemed
perfectly indifferent ; he continued to sup-
ply information in regard to his own fam-
ily. "My father's name is Ezra B. Mil-
ler," he announced. " My father ain't in
Europe ; my father's in a better place
than Europe."

Winterbourne imagined for a moment
that this was the manner in which the
child had been taught to intimate that
Mr. Miller had been removed to the sphere
of celestial rewards. But Randolph im-
mediately added, " My father's in Sche-
nectady. He's got a big business. My
father's rich, you bet !"

" Well !" ejaculated Miss Miller, low-
ering her parasol and looking at the em-
broidered border. Winterbourne presently
released the child, who departed, dragging
his alpenstock along the path. " He
doesn't like Europe," said the young girl.
" Pie wants to go back."

" To Schenectady, you mean ?"

" Yes ; he wants to go right home.
He hasn't got any boys here. There is
one boy here, but he always goes round
with a teacher ; they won't let him play."

"And your brother hasn't any teacher?"
Winterbourne inquired.

" Mother thought of getting him one
to travel round with us. There was a
lady told her of a very good teacher ; an
American lady — perhaps you know her —
Mrs. Sanders. I think she came from
Boston. She told her of this teacher,
and we thought of getting him to travel

round with us. But Randolph said he
didn't want a teacher travelling round
with us. He said he wouldn't have lessons
when he was in the cars. And we are in
the cars about half the time. There was
an English lady we met in the cars — I
think her name was Miss Featherstone ;
perhaps you know her. She wanted to
know why I didn't give Randolph lessons
— give him 'instructions,' she called it. I
guess he could give me more instruction
than I could give him. He's very smart."

"Yes," said Winterbourne ; "he seems
very smart."

" Mother's going to get a teacher for
him as soon as we get to Italy. Can you
get good teachers in Italy ?"

" Very good, I should think," said
Winterbourne.

" Or else she's going to find some school.
He ought to learn some more. He's only
nine. He's going to college." And in
this way Miss Miller continued to con-
verse upon the affairs of her family, and
upon other topics. She sat there with
her extremely pretty hands, ornamented
with very brilliant rings, folded in her
lap, and with her pretty eyes now resting
upon those of Winterbourne, now wan-

dering over the garden, the people who
passed by, and the beautiful view. She
talked to Winterbourne as if she had
known him a long time. He found it
very pleasant. It was many years since
he had heard a young girl talk so much.
It might have been said of this unknown
young lady, who had come and sat down
beside him upon a bench, that she chat-
tered. She was very quiet ; she sat in a
charming, tranquil attitude, but her lips
and her eyes were constantly moving.
She had a soft, slender, agreeable voice,
and her tone was decidedly sociable. She
gave Winterbourne a history of her move-
ments and intentions, and those of her
mother and brother, in Europe, and enu-
merated, in particular, the various hotels
at which they had stopped. " That Eng-
lish lady in the cars," she said — " Miss
Featherstone — asked me if we didn't all
live in hotels in America. I told her I
had never been in so many hotels in my
life as since I came to Europe. I have
never seen so many — it's nothing but
hotels." But Miss Miller did not make
this remark with a querulous accent ; she
appeared to be in the best humor with
everything. She declared that the hotels

were very good, when once you got
used to their ways, and that Europe
was perfectly sweet. She was not dis-
appointed— not a bit. Perhaps it was
because she had heard so much about
it before. She had ever so many in- '
timate friends that had been there v
ever so many times. And then she had
had ever so many dresses and things from
Paris. Whenever she put on a Paris dress
she felt as if she were in Europe.

u It was a kind of a wishing-cap," said
Winterbourne.

" Yes," said Miss Miller, without ex-
amining this analogy ; " it always
made me wish I was here. But I
needn't have done that for dresses.
I am sure they send all the pretty
ones to America; you see the most
frightful things here. The only
thing I don't like," she proceed-
ed, " is the society. There isn't
any society ; or, if there is, I don't
know where it
keeps itself. Do
you? I suppose
there is some
society some-
where,

but I haven't seen anything of it. I'm
very fond of society, and I have always
had a great deal of it. I don't mean only
in Schenectady, but in New York. I used
to go to New York every winter. In
New York I had lots of society. Last
winter I had seventeen dinners given
me; and three of them were by gentle-
men," added Daisy Miller. " I have more
friends in New York than in Schenecta-
dy— more gentleman friends; and more
young lady friends, too," she resumed in
a moment. She paused again for an in-
stant; she was looking at Winterbourne
with all her prettiness in her lively eyes,
and in her light, slightly monotonous
smile. " I have always had," she said,
" a great deal of gentlemen's society."

Poor Winterbourne was amused, per-
plexed, and decidedly charmed. He had
never yet heard a young girl express her-
self in just this fashion — never, at least,
save in cases where to say such things
seemed a kind of demonstrative evidence
of a certain laxity of deportment. And
yet was he to accuse Miss Daisy Miller
of actual or potential incondutie, as they
said at Geneva? He felt that he had
lived at Geneva so long that he had lost

a good deal; be had become disbabituated
to the American tone. Never, indeed,
since he had grown old enough to appre-
ciate things had be encountered a young
American girl of so pronounced a type
as this. Certainly she was very charming,
but how deucedly sociable ! Was she
simply a pretty girl from New York
State ? were they all like that, the pretty
girls who had a good deal of gentlemen's
society ? Or was she also a designing, an
audacious, an unscrupulous young person?
Winterbourne had lost his instinct in this
matter, and his reason could not help him.
Miss Daisy Miller looked extremely inno-
cent. Some people had told him that, after
all, American girls were exceedingly inno-
cent ; and others had told him that, after
all, they were not. He was inclined to
think Miss Daisy Miller was a flirt — a
pretty American flirt. He had never, as
yet, had any relations with young ladies
of this category. He had known, here in
Europe, two or three women — persons
older than Miss Daisy Miller, and pro-
vided, for respectability's sake, with hus-
bands— who were great coquettes — dan-
gerous, terrible women, with whom one's
relations were liable to take a serious turn.

But this young girl was not a coquette in
that sense ; she was very unsophisticated ;
she was only a pretty American flirt.
Winterbourne was almost grateful for hav-
ing found the formula that applied to Miss
Daisy Miller. He leaned back in his seat ;
he remarked to himself that she had the
most charming nose he had ever seen ; he
wondered what were the regular con-
ditions and limitations of one's intercourse
with a pretty American flirt. It presently
became apparent that he was on the way
to learn.

"Have you been to that old castle?"
asked the young girl, pointing with her
parasol to the far-gleaming walls of the
Chateau de Chillon.

" Yes, formerly, more than once," said
Winterbourne. "You too, I suppose, have
seen it ?"

" No ; we haven't been there. I want
to go there dreadfully. Of course I mean
to go there. I wouldn't go away from
here without having seen that old castle."

" It's a very pretty excursion," said
Winterbourne, " and very easy to make.
You can drive or go by the little steamer."

"You can go in the cars," said Miss
Miller.

"Yes; you can go in the cars," Winter-
bourne assented.

" Our courier says they take you right
up to the castle," the young girl contin-
ued. " We were going last week ; but my
mother gave out. She suffers dreadfully
from dyspepsia. She said she couldn't
go. Randolph wouldn't go, either ; he
says he doesn't think much of old castles.
But I guess we'll go this week, if we can
get Randolph."

" Your brother is
'-— not interested in an-
cient monuments?"
Winterbourne inquired, smil-
ing.

" He says he don't care
much about old castles. He's only nine.
He wants to stay at the hotel. Mother's
afraid to leave him alone, and
•^•^^ the courier won't stay with
him ; so we haven't been to
many places. But it will
be too bad if we don't go
up there." And Miss Mil-
ler pointed again at the Cha-
teau de Chillon.

"I should think it might
be arranged," said Winter-

bourne. " Couldn't you get some one to
stay for the afternoon with Randolph ?"

Miss Miller looked at him a moment,
and then very placidly, "I wish you would
stay with him !" she said.

Winterbourne hesitated a moment. " I
should much rather go to Chillon with

you"

" With me?" asked the young girl, with
the same placidity.

She didn't rise, blushing, as a young
girl at Geneva would have done; and yet
Winterbourne, conscious that he had been
very bold, thought it possible that she was
offended. " With your mother," he an-
swered, very respectfully.

But it seemed that both his audacity
and his respect were lost upon Miss Daisy
Miller. "I guess my mother won't go,
after all," she said. " She don't like to
ride round in the afternoon. But did you
really mean what you said just now, that
you would like to go up there ?"

"Most earnestly," Winterbourne de-
clared.

" Then we may arrange it. If mother
will stay with Randolph, I guess Eugenio
will."

" Eugenio ?" the young man inquired.

"Eugenie's our courier. He doesn't
like to stay with Eandolph; he's the most
fastidious man I ever saw. But he's a
splendid courier. I guess he'll stay at
home with Randolph if mother does, and
then we can go to the castle."

Winterbourne reflected for an instant
as lucidly as possible — " we " could only
mean Miss Daisy Miller and himself. This
programme seemed almost too agreeable
for credence ; he felt as if he ought to
kiss the young lady's hand. Possibly he
would have done so, and quite spoiled the
project ; but at this moment another per-
son, presumably Eugenio, appeared. A
tall, handsome man, with superb whiskers,
wearing a velvet morning-coat and a brill-
iant watch-chain, approached Miss Miller,
looking sharply at her companion. " Oh,
Eugenio !" said Miss Miller, with the
friendliest accent.

Eugenio had looked at Winterbourne
from head to foot ; he now bowed gravely
to the young lady. " I have the honor to
inform mademoiselle that luncheon is
upon the table."

Miss Miller slowly rose. " See here,
Eugenio !" she said ; " I'm going to that
old castle, anyway."

" To the Chateau de Chillon, madem-
oiselle?" the courier inquired. "Madem-
oiselle has made arrangements?" he add-
ed, in a tone which struck Winterbourne
as very impertinent.

Eugenio's tone apparently threw, even
to Miss Miller's own apprehension, a
slightly ironical light upon the young
girl's situation. She turned to Winter-
bourne, blushing a little — a very little.
" You won't back out ?" she said.

" I shall not be happy till we go !" he
protested.

"And you are staying in this hotel?"
she went on. "And you are really an
American ?"

The courier stood looking at Winter-
bourne offensively. The young man,
at least, thought his manner of look-
ing an offence to Miss Miller ; it
conveyed an imputation
that she "picked

up" ac-

quaintances. " I shall
liave the honor of presenting to you
a person who will tell you all about
me," he said, smiling, and
referring to his aunt.

" Oh, well, we'll go some day," said
Miss Miller. And she gave him a smile
and turned away. She put up her parasol
and walked back to the inn beside Euge-
nio. Winterbourne stood looking after
her ; and as she moved away, drawing
her muslin furbelows over the gravel,
said to himself that she had the tournure
of a princess.

He had, however, engaged to do more
than proved feasible, in promising to pre-
sent his aunt, Mrs. Costello, to Miss Daisy
Miller. As soon as the former lady had got
better of her headache he waited upon
her in her apartment; and, after the prop-
er inquiries in regard to her health, he
asked her if she had observed in the hotel
an American family — a mamma, a daugh-
ter, and a little boy.

" And a courier ?" said Mrs. Costello.
" Oh yes, I have observed them. Seen
them — heard them — and kept out of their
way." Mrs. Costello was a widow with
a fortune ; a person of much distinction,
who frequently intimated that, if she were
not so dreadfully liable to sick-headaches,
she would probably have left a deeper
impress upon her time. She had a long,
pale face, a high nose, and a great deal of

very striking white hair, which she wore
in large puffs and rouleaux over the top
of her head. She had two sons married
in New York, and another who was now
in Europe. This young man was amusing
himself at Hombourg ; and, though he was
on his travels, was rarely perceived to visit
any particular city at the moment selected
by his mother for her own appearance
there. Her nephew, who had come up to
Yevay expressly to see her, was therefore
more attentive than those who, as she said,
were nearer to her. He had imbibed at
Geneva the idea that one must always be
attentive to one's aunt. Mrs. Costello had
not seen him for many years, and she was
greatly pleased with him, manifesting her
approbation by initiating him into many
of the secrets of that social sway which, as
she gave him to understand, she exerted in
the American capital. She admitted that
she was very exclusive ; but, if he were
acquainted with New York, he would see
that one had to be. And her picture of
the minutely hierarchical constitution of
the society of that city, which she pre-
sented to him in many different lights,
was, to Winterbourne's imagination, al-
most oppressively striking.

He immediately perceived, from her
tone, that Miss Daisy Miller's place in
the social scale was low. " I am afraid
you don't approve of them," he said.

" They are very common," Mrs. Cos-
tello declared. " They are the sort of
Americans that one does one's duty by
not — not accepting."

"Ah, you don't accept them?" said
the young man.

" I can't, my dear Frederick. I would
if I could, but I can't."

" The young girl is very pretty," said
Winterbourne, in a moment.

" Of course she's pretty. But she
is very common."

" I see what you mean, of course,"
said Winterbourne, after another pause.

" She has that charming look that
they all have," his aunt resumed.
"I can't think where they pick
it up; and she dresses in
perfection — no, you don't
know how well she
dresses. I can't
think where
they get their
taste."

"But, my

dear aunt, she is not, after all, a Co-
manche savage."

" She is a young lady," said Mrs. Cos-
tello, " who has an intimacy with her
mamma's courier."

"An intimacy with the courier?" the
young man demanded.

" Oh, the mother is just as bad ! They
treat the courier like a familiar friend
—like a gentleman. I shouldn't wonder
if he dines with them. Very likely they
have never seen a man with such good
manners, such fine clothes, so like a gen-
tleman. He probably corresponds to the
young lady's idea of a count. He sits
with them in the garden in the evening.
I think he smokes."

Winterbourne listened with interest to
these disclosures ; they helped him to
make up his mind about Miss Daisy.
Evidently she was rather wild.

" Well," he said, " I am not a cou-
rier, and yet she was very charming to
me."

" You had better have said at first,"
said Mrs. Costello, with dignity, "that
you had made her acquaintance."

" We simply met in the garden, and we
talked a bit."

"Tout bonnement! And pray what
did you say ?"

" I said I should take the liberty of in-
troducing her to my admirable aunt."

" I am much obliged to you."

"It was to guarantee my respectabil-
ity," said Winterbourne.

" And pray who is to guarantee hers?"

"Ah, you are cruel," said the young
man. " She's a very nice young girl."

" You don't say that as if you believed
it," Mrs. Costello observed.

" She is completely uncultivated," Win-
terbourne went on. "But she is won-
derfully pretty, and, in short, she is very
nice. To prove that I believe it, I am
going to take her to the Chateau de Chil-
lon."

" You two are going off there togeth-
er ? I should say it proved just the con-
trary. How long had you known her,
may I ask, when this interesting project
was formed ? You haven't been twenty-
four hours in the house."

" I had known her half an hour !" said
Winterbourne, smiling.

"Dear me!" cried Mrs. Costello.
" What a dreadful girl !"

Her nephew was silent for some mo-

ments. " Yon really think, then," he be-
gan, earnestly, and with a desire for trust-
worthy information — " you really think
that — But he paused again.

" Think what, sir ?" said his aunt.

" That she is the sort of young lady
who expects a man, sooner or later, to
carry her off?"

"I haven't the least idea what such
young ladies expect a man to do. But I
really think that you had better not med-
dle with little American girls that are
uncultivated, as you call them. You
have lived too long out of the country.
You will be sure to make some great mis-
take. You are too innocent."

" My dear aunt, I am not so innocent,"
said Winterbourne, smiling and curling
his mustache.

" You are too guilty, then !"

Winterbourne continued to curl his
mustache, meditatively. " You won't let
the poor girl know you, then ?" he asked
at last.

" Is it literally true that she is going to
the Chateau de Chillon with you ?"

" I think that she fully intends it."

" Then, my dear Frederick," said Mrs.
Costello, " I must decline the honor of

her acquaintance. I am an old woman,
but I am not too old, thank Heaven, to
be shocked !"

" But don't they all do these things—
the young girls in America?" Winter-
bourne inquired.

Mrs. Costello stared a moment. " I
should like to see my granddaughters do
them !" she declared, grimly.

This seemed to throw some light upon
the matter, for Winterbourne remember-
ed to have heard that his pretty cousins
in New York were " tremendous flirts."
If, therefore, Miss Daisy Miller exceeded
the liberal margin allowed to these young
ladies, it was probable that anything might
be expected of her. Winterbourne was
impatient to see her again, and he was
vexed with himself that, by instinct, he
should not appreciate her justly.

Though he was impatient to see her,
he hardly knew what he should say to
her about his aunt's refusal to become ac-
quainted with her; but he discovered,
promptly enough, that with Miss Daisy
Miller there was no great need of walk-
ing on tiptoe. He found her that even-
ing in the garden, wandering about in the
warm starlight like an indolent sylph,

and swinging to and fro the largest fan
he had ever beheld. It was ten o'clock.
He had dined with his aunt, had been
sitting with her since dinner, and had
just taken leave of her till the morrow.
Miss Daisy Miller seemed very glad to
see him ; she declared it was the longest
evening she had ever passed.

" Have you been all alone ?" he asked.

" I have been walking round with
mother. But mother gets tired walking
round," she answered.

" Has she gone to bed ?"

" No ; she doesn't like to go to bed,"
said the young girl. " She doesn't sleep
— not three hours. She says she doesn't

know how she lives. She's dreadful-

ly nervous. I guess she sleeps more
than she thinks. She's gone some-
where after Randolph ; she wants to
try to get him to go to bed. He doesn't
like to go to bed."

" Let us hope she will persuade him,"
observed Winterbourne.

" She will talk to him all she can ; but

he doesn't like her to talk to him," said
Miss Daisy, opening her fan. " She's
going to try to get Eugenio to talk to
him. But he isn't afraid of Eugenio.
Engenio's a splendid courier, but he can't
make much impression on Randolph ! I
don't believe he'll go to bed before elev-
en." It appeared that Randolph's vigil
was in fact triumphantly prolonged, for
Winterbourne strolled about with the
young girl for some time without meet-
ing her mother. "I have been look-
ing round for that lady you want to
introduce me to," his companion re-
sumed. " She's your aunt." Then, on
Winterbourne's admitting the fact, and
expressing some curiosity as to how she
had learned it, she said she had heard all
about Mrs. Costello from the chamber-
maid. She was very quiet, and very
comme il faut ; she wore white puffs;
she spoke to no one, and she never dined
at the table d'hote. Every two days she
had a headache. " I think that's a lovely
description, headache and all !" said Miss
Daisy, chattering along in her thin, gay
voice. " I want to know her ever so
much. I know just what your aunt
would be ; I know I should like her. She

would be very exclusive. I like a lady
to be exclusive ; I'm dying to be ex-
clusive myself. Well, we are exclusive,
mother and I. We don't speak to every
one — or they don't speak to us. I sup-
pose it's about the same thing. Anyway,
I shall be ever so glad to know your
aunt."

Winterbourne was embarrassed. " She
would be most happy," he said ; " but I
am afraid those headaches will interfere."

The young girl looked at him through
the dusk. "But I suppose she doesn't
have a headache every day," she said,
sympathetically.

Winterbourne was silent a moment.
" She tells me she does," he answered at
last, not knowing what to say.

Miss Daisy Miller stopped, and stood
looking at him. Her prettiness was still
visible in the darkness ; she was opening
and closing her enormous fan. " She
doesn't want to know me!" she said,
suddenly. " Why don't you say so ? You
needn't be afraid. I'm not afraid !" And
she gave a little laugh.

Winterbourne fancied there was a tre-
mor in her voice ; he was touched, shock-
ed, mortified by it. " My dear young

lady," he protested, "she knows no one.
It's her wretched health."

The young girl walked on a few steps,
laughing still. " You needn't be afraid,"
she repeated. " Why should she want to
know me ?" Then she paused again ;
she was close to the parapet of the gar-
den, and in front of her was the starlit
lake. There was a vague sheen upon its
surface, and in the distance were dimly-
seen mountain forms. Daisy Miller look-
ed out upon the mysterious prospect, and
then she gave another little laugh. " Gra-
cious ! she is exclusive !" she said. Win-
terbourne wondered whether she was
seriously wounded, and for a moment al-
most wished that her sense of injury
might be such as to make it becoming in
him to attempt to reassure and comfort
her. He had a pleasant sense that she
would be very approachable for con-
solatory purposes. He felt then, for the
instant, quite ready to sacrifice his aunt,
conversationally ; to admit that she was a
proud, rude woman, and to declare that
they needn't mind her. But before he
had time to commit himself to this peril-
ous mixture of gallantry and impiety, the
young lady, resuming her walk, gave

an exclamation in quite another tone.
" Well, here's mother ! I guess she hasn't
got Randolph to go to bed." The figure
of a lady appeared, at a distance, very in-
distinct in the darkness, and advancing
with a slow and wavering movement.
Suddenly it seemed to pause.

"Are you sure it is your mother? Can
you distinguish her in this thick dusk?"
Winterbourne asked.

"Well!" cried Miss Daisy Miller, with
a laugh ; " I guess I know my own
mother. And when she has got on my
shawl, too ! She is always wearing my
things."

The lady in question, ceasing to ad-
vance, hovered vaguely about the spot at
which she had checked her steps.

" I am afraid your mother doesn't see
you," said Winterbourne. " Or perhaps,"
he added, thinking, with Miss Miller, the
joke permissible — "perhaps she feels
guilty about your shawl."

"Oh, it's a fearful old thing!" the
young girl replied, serenely. " I told her
she could wear it. She won't come here,
because she sees you."

" Ah, then," said Winterbourne, " I
had better leave you."

" Oh no ; come on !" urged Miss
Daisy Miller.

" I'm afraid your mother doesn't
approve of my walking with you."

Miss Miller gave him a serious

glance. " It isn't for me ; it's
for you — that is, it's for her.
Well, I don't know who it's
for ! But mother doesn't
like any of my gentlemen
friends. She's right down
timid. She always makes
a fuss if I introduce a gen-
tleman. Bat I <&> introduce
them — almost always. If
I didn't introduce my
gentlemen friends to mother," the
young girl added, in her little
soft, flat monotone, " I shouldn't
think it was natural."

"To introduce me," said Win-
terbourne, "you must know my

name." And he proceeded to pronounce
it to her.

"Oh dear, I can't say all that!" said
his companion, with a laugh. But by
this time they had come up to Mrs. Mil-
ler, who, as they drew near, walked to
the parapet of the garden and leaned
upon it, looking intently at the lake, and
turning her back to them. " Mother !"
said the young girl, in a tone of decision.
Upon this the elder lady turned round.
" Mr. Winterbourne," said Miss Daisy
Miller, introducing the young man very
frankly and prettily. " Common," she
was, as Mrs. Costello had pronounced her;
yet it was a wonder to Winterbourne
that, with her commonness, she had a sin-
gularly delicate grace.

Her mother was a small, spare, light
person, with a wandering eye, a very
exiguous nose, and a large forehead, dec-
orated with a certain amount of thin,
rnuch-frizzled hair. Like her daughter,
Mrs. Miller was dressed with extreme
elegance ; she had enormous diamonds in
her ears. So far as Winterbourne could
observe, she gave him no greeting — she
certainly was not looking at him. Daisy
was near her, pulling her shawl straight.

"What are you doing, poking round
here ?" this young lady inquired, but by
no means with that harshness of accent
which her choice of words may imply.

" I don't know," said her mother, turn-
ing towards the lake again.

" I shouldn't think you'd want that
shawl !" Daisy exclaimed.

" "Well, I do !" her mother answered,
with a little laugh.

" Did you get Randolph to go to bed ?"
asked the young girl.

" No ; I couldn't induce him," said
Mrs. Miller, very gently. " He wants to
talk to the waiter. He likes to talk to
that waiter."

"I was telling Mr. Winterbourne," the
young girl went on ; and to the young
man's ear her tone might have indicated
that she had been uttering his name all
her life.

"Oh yes!" said Winterbourne; "I
have the pleasure of knowing your son."

Randolph's mamma was silent ; she
turned her attention to the lake. But at
last she spoke. " Well, I don't see how
he lives !''

"Anyhow, it isn't so bad as it was at
Dover," said Daisy Miller.

"And what occurred at Dover?" Win-
terbourne asked.

" He wouldn't go to bed at all. I guess
he sat up all night in the public parlor.
He wasn't in bed at twelve o'clock ; I
know that."

" It was half-past twelve," declared
Mrs. Miller, with mild emphasis.

"Does he sleep much during the day?"
Winterbourne demanded.

" I guess he doesn't sleep much," Daisy
rejoined.

" I wish he would !" said her mother.
" It seems as if he couldn't."

" I think he's real tiresome," Daisy
pursued.

Then for some moments there was
silence. " Well, Daisy Miller," said the
elder lady, presently, "I shouldn't think
you'd want to talk against your own
brother !"

" Well, he is tiresome, mother," said
Daisy, quite without the asperity of a
retort.

" He's only nine," urged Mrs. Miller.

" Well, he wouldn't go to that castle,"
said the young girl. " I'm going there
with Mr. Winter bourne."

To this announcement, very placidly

mamma

offered no response. Winter-
bourne took for granted that she
deeply disapproved of the pro-
jected excursion ; but he said to
himself that she was a simple,
easily -managed person, and that a
few deferential protestations would
take the edge from her displeasure.
" Yes," he began ; " your daughter
has kindly allowed me the honor of
being her guide."

Mrs. Miller's ,
wandering eyes
attached them-

selves, with a sort of appealing air, to
Daisy, who, however, strolled a few steps
farther, gently humming to herself. " 1
presume you will go in the cars," said her
mother.

" Yes, or in the boat," said Winter-
bourne.

" Well, of course, I don't know," Mrs.
Miller rejoined. "I have never been to
that castle."

" It is a pity you shouldn't go," said
Winterbourne, beginning to feel reassur-
ed as to her opposition. And yet he was
quite prepared to find that, as a matter
of course, she meant to accompany her
daughter.

"We've been thinking ever so much
about going," she pursued ; " but it seems
as if we couldn't. Of course Daisy, she
wants to go round. But there's a lady
here — I don't know her name — she says
she shouldn't think we'd want to go to
see castles here; she should think we'd
want to wait till we got to Italy. It
seems as if there would be so many there,"
continued Mrs. Miller, with an air of in-
creasing confidence. " Of course we only
want to see the principal ones. We visited
several in England," she presently added.

" All, yes ! in England there are beau-
tiful castles," said Winterbourne. "But
Cliillon, here, is very well worth seeing."

" Well, if Daisy feels up to it—" said
Mrs. Miller, in a tone impregnated with
a sense of the magnitude of the enter-
prise. " It seems as if there was nothing
she wouldn't undertake."

" Oh, I think she'll enjoy it !" Winter-
bourne declared. And he desired more
and more to make it a certainty that he
was to have the privilege of a tete-a-tete
with the young lady, who was still stroll-
ing along in front of them, softly vocaliz-
ing. " You are not disposed, madam," he
inquired, " to undertake it yourself ?"

Daisy's mother looked at him an instant
askance, and then walked forward in si-
lence. Then — " I guess she had better go
alone," she said, simply. Winterbourne
observed to himself that this was a very
different type of maternity from that of
the vigilant matrons who massed them-
selves in the fore -front of social inter-
course in the dark old city at the other
end of the lake. But his meditations
were interrupted by hearing his name
very distinctly pronounced by Mrs. Mil-
ler's unprotected daughter.

"Mr. Winterbonrne!" murmured Daisy.
" Mademoiselle !" said the young man.
" Don't you want to take me out in a
boat?"

" At present !" he asked.
" Of course !" said Daisy.
" Well, Annie Miller !" exclaimed her
mother.

" I beg you, madam, to let her go,"
said Winterbourne, ardently ; for he had
never yet enjoyed the sensation of guid-
ing through the summer starlight a
skiff freighted with a fresh and
beautiful young girl.

" I shouldn't
think she'd
want to,"
said her
mother. " I
should think
she'd rath-
er go in-
doors."

"I'm sure Mr. Winterbourne wants to
take me," Daisy declared. " He's so aw-
fully devoted !"

" I will row you over to Chillon in the
starlight."

" I don't believe it !" said Daisy.

"Well !" ejaculated the elder lady again.

" You haven't spoken to me for half an
hour," her daughter went on.

" I have been having some very pleas-
ant conversation with your mother," said
Winterbourne.

" Well, I want you to take me out in
a boat !" Daisy repeated. They had all
stopped, and she had turned round and
was looking at Winterbourne. Her face
wore a charming smile, her pretty eyes
were gleaming, she was swinging her
great fan about. No ; it's impossible to
be prettier than that, thought Winter-
bourne.

" There are half a dozen boats moored
at that landing-place," he said, pointing to
certain steps which descended from the
garden to the lake. " If you will do me
the honor to accept my arm, we will go
and select one of them."

Daisy stood there smiling; she threw
back her head and gave a little light

laugh. "I like a gentleman to be formal!"
she declared.

" I assure you it's a formal offer."

" I was bound I would make you say
something," Daisy went on.

" You see, it's not very difficult," said
"Winterbourne. "But I am afraid you
are chaffing me."

" I think not, sir," remarked Mrs. Mil-
ler, very gently.

" Do, then, let me give you a row," he
said to the young girl.

" It's quite lovely, the way you say
that !" cried Daisy.

"It will be still more lovely to do it."

" Yes, it would be lovely !" said Daisy.
But she made no movement to accom-
pany him ; she only stood there laugh-
ing.

" I should think you had better find out
what time it is," interposed her mother.

" It is eleven o'clock, madam," said a
voice, with a foreign accent, out of the
neighboring darkness ; and Winterbourne,
turning, perceived the florid personage
who was in attendance upon the two la-
dies. He had apparently just approached.

" Oh, Eugenio," said Daisy, " I am go-
ing out in a boat !"

Eugenio bowed. " At eleven o'clock,
mademoiselle ?"

" I am going with Mr. Winterbourne —
this very minute."

" Do tell her she can't," said Mrs. Mil-
ler to the courier.

" I think you had better not go out in
a boat, mademoiselle," Eugenio declared.

Winterbourne wished to Heaven this
pretty girl were not so familiar with her
courier ; but he said nothing.

" I suppose you don't think it's proper!"
Daisy exclaimed. " Eugenio doesn't think
anything's proper."

" I am at your service," said Winter-
bourne.

" Does mademoiselle propose to go
alone ?" asked Eugenio of Mrs. Miller.

" Oh, no ; with this gentleman !" an-
swered Daisy's mamma.

The courier looked for a moment at
Winterbourne — the latter thought he was
smiling — and then, solemnly, with a bow,
" As mademoiselle pleases !" he said.

" Oh, I hoped you would make a fuss !"
said Daisy. " I don't care to go now.

" I myself shall make a fuss if you don't
go," said Winter- , bourne.
That's all I <&, want-

^ >'-"/:

• *

fuss !" And the young girl began to laugh
again.

" Mr. Randolph has gone to bed !" the
courier announced, frigidly.

" Oh, Daisy ; now we can go !" said
Mrs. Miller.

Daisy turned away from Winterbourne,
looking at him, smiling, and fanning her-
self. " Good-night," she said ; " I hope
you are disappointed, or disgusted, or
something !"

He looked at her, taking the hand she
offered him. "I am puzzled," he an-
swered.

"Well, I hope it won't keep you
awake !" she said, very smartly ; and,
under the escort of the privileged Eu-
genio, the two ladies passed towards the
house.

Winterbourne stood looking after them ;
he was indeed puzzled. He lingered be-
side the lake for a quarter of an hour,
turning over the mystery of the young
girl's sudden familiarities and caprices.
But the only very definite conclusion he
came to was that he should enjoy deuced-
ly " going off " with her somewhere.

Two days afterwards he went off with
her to the Castle of Chillon. He waited

for her in the large hall of the hotel,
where the couriers, the servants, the for-
eign tourists, were lounging about and
staring. It was not the place he should
have chosen, but she had appointed it.
She came tripping down-stairs, buttoning
her long gloves, squeezing her folded
parasol against her pretty figure, dressed
in the perfection of a soberly elegant trav-
elling costume. Winterbourne was a man
of imagination and, as our ancestors used
to say, sensibility ; as he looked at her
dress and — on the great staircase — her
little rapid, confiding step, he felt as if
there were something romantic going for-
ward. He could have believed he was
going to elope with her. He passed out
with her among all the idle people that
were assembled there ; they were all look-
ing at her very hard ; she had begun to
chatter as soon as she joined him.
Winterbourne's prefer-
ence had been that they
should be conveyed to
Chillon in a carriage ;
but she expressed a
lively wish to go in
the little steam-
er; she de-

dared that she had a passion for steam-
boats. There was always such a lovely
breeze upon the water, and you saw such
lots of people. The sail was not long, but
Winterbourne's companion found time to
say a great many things. To the young
man himself their little excursion was so
much of an escapade — an adventure —
that, even allowing for her habitual sense
of freedom, he had some expectation of
seeing her regard it in the same way.
But it must be confessed that, in this par-
ticular, he was disappointed. Daisy
Miller was extremely animated, she
was in charming spirits; but she
was apparently not at all excited ;
she was not fluttered ; she avoided
neither his eyes nor those of any-
one else ; she blushed neither when
she looked at him nor when she felt
that people were looking at her.
People continued to look at her a
great deal, and Winterbourne took
much satisfaction in his pretty com-
panion's distinguished air. He had
been a little afraid that she would
talk loud, laugh overmuch, and
even, perhaps, desire to move about
the boat a good deal. But he quite

forgot liis fears ; lie sat smiling, with his
eyes upon her face, while, without mov-
ing from her place, she delivered herself
of a great number of original reflections.
It was the most charming garrulity he
had ever heard. He had assented to the
idea that she was " common ;" but was
she so, after all, or was he simply getting
used to her commonness? Her conver-
sation was chiefly of what metaphysicians
term the objective cast; but every now
and then it took a subjective turn.

" What on earth are you so grave
about?" she suddenly demanded, fixing
her agreeable eyes upon Winterbourne's.

" Am I grave?" he asked. " I had an
idea I was grinning from ear to ear."

" You look as if you were taking me
to a funeral. If that's a grin, your ears
are very near together."

" Should you like me to dance a horn-
pipe on the deck ?"

"Pray do, and I'll carry round your
hat. It will pay the expenses of our
journey."

" I never was better pleased in my
life," murmured Winterbourne.

She looked at him a moment, and then
burst into a little laugh. " I like to make

you say those things ! You're a queer
mixture !"

In the castle, after they had landed, the
subjective element decidedly prevailed.
Daisy tripped about the vaulted cham-
bers, rustled her skirts in the corkscrew
staircases, flirted back with a pretty little
cry and a shudder from the edge of the
oubliettes, and turned a singularly well-
shaped ear to everything that Winter-
bourne told her about the place. But he
saw that she cared very little for feudal
antiquities, and that the dusky traditions
of Chillon made but a slight impression
upon her. They had the good-fortune to
have been able to walk about without
other companionship than that of the
custodian ; and Winterbourne arranged
with this functionary that they should
not be hurried — that they should linger
and pause wherever they chose. The
custodian interpreted the bargain gener-
ously— Winterbourne, on his side, had
been generous — and ended by leaving
them quite to themselves. Miss Miller's
observations were not remarkable for log-
ical consistency; for anything she wanted
to say she was sure to find a pretext.
She found a great many pretexts in the

r.c

rugged embrasures of Chillon for asking
Winterbourne sudden questions about him-
self— his family, his previous history, his
tastes, his habits, his intentions — and for
supplying information upon correspond-
ing points in her own personality. Of
her own tastes, habits, and intentions Miss
Miller was prepared to give the most def-
inite, and, indeed, the most favorable ac-
count.

"Well, I hope you know enough !" she
said to her companion, after he had told
her the history of the unhappy Bonnivard.
" I never saw a man that knew so much !"
The history of Bonnivard had evidently,
as they say, gone into one ear and out
of the other. But Daisy went on to
say that she wished Winterbourne
would travel with them, and "go
round " with them ; they might know
something, in that case. " Don't you
want to come and teach Randolph ?"
she asked. Winterbourne said that
nothing could possibly
please him so much, but
that he had unfortunately
other occupations. " Other
occupations? I don't be-
lieve it !" said Miss Daisy.

"What do you mean? You are not in
business." The young man admitted that
he was not in business; but he had en-
gagements which, even within a day or
two, would force him to go back to Gene-
va. " Oh, bother !" she said ; " I don't
believe it !" and she began to talk about
something else. But a few moments later,
when he was pointing out to her the pretty
design of an antique fireplace, she broke
out irrelevantly, " You don't mean to say
you are going back to Geneva ?"

"It is a melancholy fact that I shall
have to return to-morrow."

"Well, Mr. Winterbourne," said Daisy,
" I think you're horrid !"

" Oh, don't say such dreadful things !"
said Winterbourne — "just at the last !"

" The last !" cried the young girl ; " I
call it the first. I have half a mind to
leave you here and go straight back to the
hotel alone." And for the next ten min-
utes she did nothing but call him horrid.
Poor Winterbourne was fairly bewildered;
no young lady had as yet done him the
honor to be so agitated by the announce-
ment of his movements. His companion,
after this, ceased to pay any attention to
the curiosities of Chi lion or the beauties

of the lake; she opened
fire upon the mysteri-
^. ous charmer of Gene-
va, whom she appeared
to have instantly taken it for granted
that lie was hurrying back to see. How
did Miss Daisy Miller know that there
was a charmer in Geneva ? Winter-
bourne, who denied the existence of such
a person, was quite unable to discover ;
and he was divided between amazement
at the rapidity of her induction and
amusement at the frankness of her per-
siflage. She seemed to him, in all this,
an extraordinary mixture of innocence
and crudity. "Does she never allow you

more than three days at a time?" asked
Daisy, ironically. " Doesn't she give you
a vacation in summer ? There is no one
so hard worked but they can get leave
to go off somewhere at this season. I
suppose, if you stay another day, she'll
come after you in the boat. Do wait over
till Friday, and I will go down to the
landing to see her arrive !" Winter-
bourne began to think he had been wrong
to feel disappointed in the temper in
which the young lady had embarked. If
he had missed the personal accent, the
personal accent was now making its ap-
pearance. It sounded very distinctly, at
last, in her telling him she would stop
"teasing" him if he would promise her
solemnly to come down to Rome in the
winter.

"That's not a difficult promise to make,"
said Winterbourne. "My aunt has taken
an apartment in Rome for the winter,
and has already asked me to come and see
her."

" I don't want you to come for your
aunt," said Daisy ; " I want you to come
for me." And this was the only allusion
that the young man was ever to hear her
make to his invidious kinswoman. He

declared that, at any rate, he would cer-
tainly come. After this Daisy stopped
teasing. Winterbourne took a carriage,
and they drove back to Yevay in the
dusk. The young girl was very quiet.

In the evening Winterbourne mention-
ed to Mrs. Costello that he had spent the
afternoon at Chillon with Miss Daisy
Miller.

" The Americans — of the courier ?"
asked this lady.

" Ah, happily," said Winterbourne, " the
courier stayed at home."

" She went with you all alone ?"

" All alone."

Mrs. Costello sniffed a little at her smell-
ing-bottle. "And that," she exclaimed,
"is the young person whom you wanted
me to know !"

INTERBOUKNE, who had returned to Ge-
neva the day after his excursion to Chil-
lon, went to Rome towards the end of
January. His aunt had been established
there for several weeks, and he had re-
ceived a couple of letters from her.
"Those people you were so devoted to
last summer at Yevay have turned up
here, courier arid all," she wrote. " They
seem to have made several acquaintances,
but the courier continues to be the most
intime. The young lady, however, is also
very intimate with some third-rate Ital-
ians, with whom she rackets about in a

way that makes much talk. Bring me
that pretty novel of Cherbuliez's — Paule
Mere — and don't come later than the
23d."

In the natural course of events, Win-
terbourne, on arriving in Rome, would
presently have ascertained Mrs. Miller's
address at the American banker's, and
have gone to pay his compliments to
Miss Daisy. " After what happened at
Yevay, I think I may certainly call upon
them," he said to Mrs. Costello.

"If, after what happens — at Yevay
and everywhere — you desire to keep up
the acquaintance, you are very welcome.
Of course a man may know every one.
Men are welcome to the privilege !"

" Pray what is it that happens — here,
for instance?" Winterbourne demanded.

" The girl goes about alone with her
foreigners. As to what happens further,
you must apply elsewhere for informa-
tion. She has picked up half a dozen of
the regular Roman fortune-hunters, and
she takes them about to people's houses.
When she comes to a party she brings
with her a gentleman with a good deal
of manner and a wonderful mustache."

" And where is the mother ?"

"I haven't the least idea. They are
very dreadful people."

Winterbourne meditated a moment.
a They are very ignorant — very innocent
only. Depend upon it they are not bad."

"They are hopelessly vulgar," said
Mrs. Costello. "Whether or no being
hopelessly vulgar is being 'bad ' is a ques-
tion for the metaphysicians. They are
bad enough to dislike, at any rate ; and
for this short life that is quite enough."

The news that Daisy Miller was sur-
rounded by half a dozen wonderful mus-
taches checked Winterbourne's impulse
to go straightway to see her. He had,
perhaps, not definitely flattered himself
that he had made an ineffaceable impres-
sion upon her heart, but he was annoyed
at hearing of a state of affairs so little in
harmony with an image that had lately
flitted in and out of his own meditations;
the image of a very pretty girl looking
out of an old Roman window and asking
herself urgently when Mr. Winterbourne
would arrive. If, however, he determined
to wait a little before reminding Miss
Miller of his claims to her consideration,
he went very soon to call upon two or
three other friends. One of these friends

was an American lady who had spent
several winters at Geneva, where she had
placed her children at school. She was
a very accomplished woman, and she
lived in the Via Gregorian a. Winter-
bourne found her in a little crimson
drawing-room on a third floor ; the room
was filled with southern sunshine. He
had not been there ten minutes when the
servant came in, announcing " Madame
Mila !" This announcement was present-
ly followed by the entrance of little
Randolph Miller, who stopped in the
middle of the room and stood staring at
Winterbourne. An instant later his pret-
ty sister crossed the threshold ; and then,
after a considerable interval, Mrs. Miller
slowly advanced.

"I know you!" said Randolph.

" I'm sure you know a great many
things," exclaimed Winterbourne, taking
him by the hand. " How is your educa-
tion coming on ?"

Daisy was exchanging greetings very
prettily with her hostess ; but when she

heard Winterbourne's voice she quick-
ly turned her head. "Well, I de-
clare !" she said.

"I told you I should come, you

know," Winterbourne rejoined, smil-
ing.

"Well, I didn't believe it," said Miss
Daisy.

" I am much obliged to you," laughed
the young man.

" You might have come to see me !"
said Daisy.

" I arrived only yesterday."

" I don't believe that !" the young girl
declared.

Winterbourne turned with a protesting
smile to her mother ; but this lady evaded
his glance, and, seating herself, fixed her
eyes upon her son. "We've got a bigger
place than this," said Randolph. "It's
all gold on the walls."

Mrs. Miller turned uneasily in her
chair. " I told you if I were to bring
you, you would say something!" she
murmured.

"I told you!" Randolph exclaimed.
" I tell you, sir !" he added, jocosely, giv-
ing Winterbourne a thump on the knee.
" It is bigger, too !"

Daisy had entered upon a lively con-
versation with her hostess, and Winter-
bourne judged it becoming to address a
few words to her mother. " I hope you

have been well since we parted at Ve-
vay," he said.

Mrs. Miller now certainly looked at
him — at his chin. " Not very well, sir,"
she answered.

" She's got the dyspepsia," said Ean-
•"/?. dolph. " I've got it, too. Father's got
/ it. I've got it most !"

This announcement, instead of embar-
rassing Mrs. Miller, seemed to relieve
her. " I suffer from the liver," she said.
"I think it's this climate; it's less bracing
than Scheriectady, especially in the win-
ter season. I don't know whether you
know we reside at Schenectady. I was
saying to Daisy that I certainly hadn't
found any one like Dr. Davis, and I didn't
believe I should. Oh, at Schenectady he
stands first ; they think everything of
him. He has so much to do, and yet
there was nothing he wouldn't do for me.
He said he never saw anything like my
dyspepsia, but he was bound to cure it.
I'm sure there was nothing he wouldn't
try. He was just going to try something
new when we came off. Mr. Miller want-
ed Daisy to see Europe for herself. But
T wrote to Mr. Miller that it seems as if
I couldn't get on without Dr. Davis. At

Schenectady he stands at the very top ;
and there's a great deal of sickness there,
too. It affects my sleep."

Winterbonrne had a good deal of path-
ological gossip with Dr. Davis's patient,
during which Daisy chattered unremit-
tingly to her own companion. The young
man asked Mrs. Miller how she was
pleased with Rome. "Well, I must say
I am disappointed," she answered. " We
had heard so much about it ; I suppose
we had heard too much. But we couldn't
help that. We had been led to expect
something different."

" Ah, wait a little, and you will be-
come very fond of it," said Winter-
bourne.

" I hate it worse and worse every day !"
cried Randolph.

" You are like the infant Hannibal,"
said Winterbonrne.

"No, I ain't!" Randolph declared, at
a venture.

"You are not much like an infant,"
said his mother. " But we have seen
places," she resumed, " that I should put
a long way before Rome." And in reply
to Winterbourne's interrogation, "There's
Zurich," she concluded, " I think Zurich

is lovely ; and we hadn't heard half so
much about it."

"The best place we've seen is the City
of Eichmond !" said Kandolph.

"He means the ship," his mother ex-
plained. "We crossed in that ship.
Kandolph had a good time on the City
of Richmond"

"It's the best place I've seen," the
child repeated. " Only it was turned the
wrong way."

"Well, we've got to turn the right way
some time," said Mrs. Miller, witli a little
laugh. Winterbourne expressed the hope
that her daughter at least found some
gratification in Kome, and she declared
that Daisy was quite carried away. " It's
on account of the society — the society's
splendid. She goes round everywhere;
she has made a great number of acquaint-
ances. Of course she goes round more
than I do. I must say they have been
very sociable ; they have taken her right
in. And then she knows a great many
gentlemen. Oh, she thinks there's noth-
ing like Rome. Of course, it's a great
deal pleasanter for a young lady if she
knows plenty of gentlemen."

By this time Daisy had turned her

attention again to Winter-bourne. "I've
been telling Mrs. Walker how mean you
were !" the young girl announced.

" And what is the evidence you
have offered ?" asked Winterbourne,
rather annoyed at Miss Miller's
want of appreciation of the zeal of
an admirer who on his way down
to Rome had stopped neither at
Bologna nor at Florence, simply
because of a certain sentimental
impatience. He remembered that
a cynical compatriot had once told
him that American women — the
pretty ones, and this gave a large-
ness to the axiom — were at once
the most exacting in the world and
the least endowed with a sense of
indebtedness.

"Why, you were awfully mean at
Vevay," said Daisy. "You wouldn't
do anything. You wouldn't stay
there when I asked you."

" My dearest young lady," cried
Winterbourne, with eloquence,
" have I come all the way to Rome
to encounter your reproaches ?"

" Just hear him say that !" said
Daisy to her hostess, giving a twist

to a. bow on this lady's dress. " Did you
ever bear anything so quaint ?"

" So quaint, my dear ?" murmured Mrs.
Walker, in the tone of a partisan of Win-
terbourne.

" Well, I don't know," said Daisy, fin-
gering Mrs. Walker's ribbons. "Mrs.
Walker, 1 want to tell yon something."

" Mother-r," interposed Randolph, with
his rough ends to his words, " I tell you
you've got to go. Eugenio '11 raise —
something !"

" I'm not afraid of Eugenio," said Daisy,
with a toss of her head. "Look here,
Mrs. Walker," she went on, " you know
I'm coming to your party."

" I am delighted to hear it,"

" I've got a lovely dress !"

"I am very sure of that."

"But I want to ask a favor — permis-
sion to bring a friend."

"I shall be happy to see any of your
friends," said Mrs. Walker, turning with
a smile to Mrs. Miller.

" Oh, they are not my friends,'1 an-
swered Daisy's mamma, smiling shyly, in
her own fashion. " I never spoke to
them."

" It's an intimate friend of mine — Mr.

Giovanelli," said Daisy, without a tremor
in her clear little voice, or a shadow on
her brilliant little face.

Mrs. Walker was silent a moment; she
gave a rapid glance at Winterbourne. " I
shall be glad to see Mr. Giovanelli," she
then saiii.

"He's an Italian," Daisy pursued, with
the prettiest serenity. " He's a great
friend of mine ; he's the handsomest man
in the world — except Mr. Winterbourne!
He knows plenty of Italians, but he
wants to know some Americans. He
thinks ever so much of Americans. He's
tremendously clever. He's perfectly
lovely !"

It was settled that this brilliant per-
sonage should be brought to Mrs. Walk-
er's party, and then Mrs. Miller prepared
to take her leave. " I guess we'll go
back to the hotel," she said.

" You may go back to the hotel, moth-
er, but I'm going to take a walk," said
Daisy.

" She's going to walk with Mr. Giova-
nelli," Randolph proclaimed.

" I am going to the Pincio," said Daisy,
smiling.

" Alone, my dear — at this hour ?" Mrs.

Walker asked. The afternoon was draw-
ing to a close — it was the hour for the
throng of carriages and of contemplative
pedestrians. " I don't think it's safe, my
dear," said Mrs. Walker.

" Neither do I," subjoined Mrs. Miller.
"You'll get the fever, as sure as you live.
Remember what Dr. Davis told you !"

" Give her some medicine before she
goes," said Randolph.

The company had risen to its feet ;
Daisy, still showing her pretty teeth, bent
over and kissed her hostess. " Mrs.
Walker, you are too perfect," she said.
" I'm not going alone ; I am going to
meet a friend."

" Your friend won't keep you from
getting the fever," Mrs. Miller observed.
"Is it Mr. Giovanelli?" asked the
hostess.

Winterbourne was watching the young
girl ; at this question his attention
quickened. She stood there smiling
and smoothing her bonnet ribbons ;
she glanced at Winterbourne.
Then, while she glanced and
smiled, she answered, without a
shade of hesitation, "Mr. Giova-
nelli— the beautiful Giovanelli."

" My dear young friend," said Mrs.
Walker, taking her hand, pleadingly,
" don't walk off to the Pincio at this
unhealthy hour to meet a beautiful Ital-
ian."

" Well, he speaks English," said Mrs.
Miller.

" Gracious me !" Daisy exclaimed, " I
don't want to do anything improper.
There's an easy way to settle it." She
continued to glance at Winterbourne.
"The Pincio is only a hundred yards dis-
tant; and if Mr. Winterbourne were as
polite as he pretends, he would offer to
walk with me!"

Winterbourne's politeness hastened to
affirm itself, and the young girl gave him
gracious leave to accompany her. They
passed down -stairs before her mother,
and at the door Winterbourne perceived
Mrs. Miller's carriage drawn up, with the
ornamental courier, whose acquaintance
he had made at Yevay, seated within.
" Good-bye, Engenio!" cried Daisy; "I'm
going to take a walk." The distance
from the Via Gregoriana to the beautiful
garden at the other end of the Pincian
Hill is, in fact, rapidly traversed. As the
day was splendid, however, and the con-.

7.-.

course of vehicles, walkers, and loungers
numerous, the young Americans found
their progress much delayed. This fact
was highly agreeable to Winter-
bourne, in spite of his conscious-
ness of his singular situation. The
slow-moving, idly-gazing Roman
crowd bestowed much attention
upon- the extremely pretty young
L^ foreign lady who was passing
|p through it upon his arm ; and he
wondered what on earth had been
in Daisy's mind when she pro-
posed to expose herself, unattend-
ed, to its appreciation. His own
mission, to her sense, apparently,
was to consign her to the hands
of Mr. Giovanelli ; but Winter-
bourne, at once annoyed and grat-
ified, resolved that he would do
no such thing.

"Why haven't you been to see
me ?" asked Daisy. " You can't
get out of that."

" I have had the honor of tell-
ing you that I have only just
stepped out of the train."

"You must have stayed in the train a
good while after it stopped!" cried the
young girl, with her little laugh. " I
suppose you were asleep. You have had
time to go to see Mrs. Walker."

"I knew Mrs. Walker- Winter-
bourne began to explain.

" I know where you knew her. You
knew her at Geneva. She told me so.
Well, you knew me at Yevay. That's
just as good. So you ought to have
come." She asked him no other ques-
tion than this ; she began to prattle about
her own affairs. "We've got splendid
rooms at the hotel ; Eugenio says they're
the best rooms in Rome. We are going
to stay all winter, if we don't die of the
fever; and I guess we'll stay then. It's
a great deal nicer than I thought ; I
thought it would be fearfully quiet ; I
was sure it would be awfully poky. I
was sure we should be going round all
the time with one of those dreadful old
men that explain about the pictures and
things. But we only had about a week
of that, and now I'm enjoying myself.
I know ever so many people, and they
are all so charming. The society's ex-
tremely select. There are all kinds —

English and Germans and Italians. I
think I like the English best. I like
their style of conversation. But there
are some lovely Americans. I never saw
anything so hospitable. There's some-
thing or other every day. There's not
much dancing; but I must say I never
thought dancing was everything. I was
always fond" of conversation. I guess I
shall have plenty at Mrs. Walker's, her
rooms are so small." When they had
passed the gate of the Pincian Gardens,
Miss Miller began to wonder where Mr.
Giovanelli might be. "We had better
go straight to that place in front," she
said, " where you look at the view."

" I certainly shall not help you to find
him," Winterbourne declared.

" Then I shall find him without you,"
said Miss Daisy.

"You certainly won't leave me !" cried
Winterbourne.

She burst into her little laugh. " Are
you afraid you'll get lost — or run over?
But there's Giovanelli, leaning against that
tree. He's staring at the women in the car-
riages ; did you ever see anything so cool ?"

Winterbourne perceived at some dis-
tance a little man standing with folded

arms nursing his cane. He had a hand-
some face, an artfully poised hat, a glass
in one eye, and a nosegay in his button-
hole. Winterbourne looked at him a
moment, and then said, " Do you mean
to speak to that man ?"

" Do I mean to speak to him ? Why,
you don't suppose I mean to communi-
cate by signs ?"

"Pray understand, then," said
Winterbourne, " that I intend to
remain with you."

Daisy stopped and looked at
him, without a sign of troubled
consciousness in her face ; with
nothing but the presence of her
charming eyes and her happy dim-
ples. "Well, she's a cool one!"
thought the young man.

" I don't like the way you say
that," said Daisy. "It's too im-
perious."

" I beg your pardon if I say it
wrong. The main point is to give
you an idea of my meaning."

The young girl looked at him
more gravely, but with eyes that
were prettier than ever. " I have
never allowed a gentleman to die-

tate to me, or to interfere with anything
I do."

"I think you have made a mistake,"
said Winterbourne. " You should some-
times listen to a gentleman — the right
one."

Daisy began to laugh again. " I do
nothing but listen to gentlemen !" she ex-
claimed. " Tell me if Mr. Giovanelli is
the right one."

The gentleman with the nosegay in
his bosom had now perceived our two
friends, and was approaching the young
girl with obsequious rapidity. He bowed
to Winterbourne as well as to the latter's
companion ; he had a brilliant smile, an
intelligent eye ; Winterbourne thought
him not a bad -looking fellow, But he
nevertheless said to Daisy, " No, he's not
the right one."

Daisy evidently had a natural talent
for performing introductions ; she men-
tioned the name of each of her compan-
ions to the other. She strolled along
with one of them on each side of her;
Mr. Giovanelli, who spoke English very
cleverly — Winterbourne afterwards learn-
ed that he had practised the idiom upon
a great many American heiresses — ad-

dressed to her a great deal of very
polite nonsense ; he was extreme-
ly urbane, and the young Ameri-
can, who said nothing, reflected
upon that profundity of Italian
cleverness which enables people
to appear more gracious in pro-
portion as they are more acute-
ly disappointed. Giovanelli, of
course, had counted upon some-
thing more intimate ; he had not
bargained for a party of three.
But he kept his temper in a man-
ner which suggested far-stretch-
ing intentions. Winterbourne flattered
himself that he had taken his measure.
" He is not a gentleman," said the young
American ; " he is only a clever imita-
tion of one. He is a music -master, or
a penny-a-liner, or a third-rate artist.
I) — n his good looks!" Mr. Giovanelli
had certainly a very pretty face ; but
Winterbourne felt a superior indigna-
tion at his own lovely fellow -country-
woman's not knowing the difference be-
tween a spurious gentleman and a real
one. Giovanelli chattered and jested,
and made himself wonderfully agreeable.
It was true that, if he was an imitation,

the imitation was brilliant. " Neverthe-
less," Winterbourne said to himself, " a
nice girl ought to know !" And then
he came back to the question whether
this was, in fact, a nice girl. • Would a
nice girl, even allowing for her being a
little American flirt, make a rendezvous
with a presumably low-lived foreigner?
The rendezvous in this case, indeed, had
been in broad daylight, and in the most
crowded corner of Rome ; but was it not
impossible to regard the choice of these
circumstances as a proof of extreme cyn-
icism? Singular though it may seem,
Winterbourne was vexed that the young
girl, in joining her amoroso, should not
appear more impatient of his own com-
pany, and he was vexed because of his
inclination. It was impossible to regard
her as a perfectly well-conducted young
lady ; she was wanting in a certain indis-
pensable delicacy. It would therefore
simplify matters greatly to be able to
treat her as the object of one of those
sentiments which are called by romancers
" lawless passions." That she should seem
to wish to get rid of him would help him
to think more lightly of her, and to be
able to think more lightly of her would

make her much less perplexing. But
Daisy, on this occasion, continued to pre-
sent herself as an inscrutable combination
of audacity and innocence.

She had been walking some quarter of
an hour, attended by her two cavaliers,
and responding in a tone of very childish
gayety, as it seemed to Winterbourne, to
the pretty speeches of Mr. Giovanelli,
when a carriage that had detached itself
from the revolving train drew up beside
the path. At the same moment Winter-
bourne perceived that his friend Mrs.
Walker — the lady whose house he had
lately left — was seated in the vehicle, and
was beckoning to him. Leaving Miss
Miller's side, he hastened to obey her
summons. Mrs. Walker was flushed ; she
wore an excited air. " It is really too
dreadful," she said. "That girl must
not do this sort of thing. She must not
walk here with you two men. Fifty
people have noticed her."

Winterbourne raised his eyebrows. "I
think it's a pity to make too much fuss
about it."

"It's a pity to let the girl ruin herself!"

"She is very innocent," said Winter-
bourne.

" She's very crazy !" cried Mrs. Walker.
"Did you ever see anything so imbecile
as her mother? After you had all left
me just now I could not sit still for
thinking of it. It seemed too pitiful
not even to attempt to save her. I order-
ed the carriage and put on my bonnet,
and came here as quickly as possible.
Thank Heaven I have found you !"
" What do you propose to do with us?"
asked Winterbourne, smilingo
" To ask her to get in, to drive
her about here for half an hour,
so that the world may see
that she is not running ab-
solutely wild, and then to

take her safely home."
jyp ^£ "I don't think it's a

jjp> very happy thought," said
^r\* Winterbourne; u but you

can try."

Mrs. Walker tried. The young man
went in pursuit of Miss Miller, who had
simply nodded and smiled at his inter-
locutor in the carriage, and had gone her
way with her companion. Daisy, on
learning that Mrs. Walker wished to
speak to her, retraced her steps with a
perfect good grace and with Mr. Giova-
nelli at her side. She declared that she
was delighted to have a chance to present
this gentleman to Mrs. Walker. She im-
mediately achieved the introduction, and
declared that she had never in her life
seen anything so lovely as Mrs. Walker's
carriage-rug.

"I am glad you admire it," said this
lady, smiling sweetly. " Will you get in
and let me put it over you ?"

" Oh no, thank you," said Daisy. " I
shall admire it much more as I see you
driving round with it."

"Do get in and drive with me!" said
Mrs. Walker.

" That would be charming, but it's so
enchanting just as I am !" and Daisy gave
a brilliant glance at the gentlemen on
either side of her.

"It may be enchanting, dear child, but
it is not the custom here," urged Mrs.

Walker, leaning forward in her victoria,
with her hands devoutly clasped.

"Well, it ought to be, then!" said
Daisy. " If I didn't walk I should ex-
pire."

" You should walk with your mother,
dear," cried the lady from Geneva, losing
patience.

" With my mother, dear !" exclaimed
the young girl. Winterbourne saw that
she scented interference. "My mother
never walked ten steps in her life. And
then, you know," she added, with a laugh,
" I am more than five years old."

" You are old enough to be more rea-
sonable. You are old enough, dear Miss
Miller, to be talked about."

Daisy looked at Mrs. Walker, smiling
intensely. "Talked about? What do
you mean?"

" Come into my carriage, and I will
tell you."

Daisy turned her quickened glance
again from one of the gentlemen beside
her to the other. Mr. Giovanelli was bow-
ing to and fro, rubbing down his gloves
and laughing very agreeably ; Winter-
bourne thought it a most unpleasant
scene. "I don't think I want to know

what you mean," said Daisy, presently.
" I don't think I should like it."

Winterbourne wished that Mrs. Walk-
er would tuck in -her carriage -rug and
drive away ; but this lady did not enjoy
being defied, as she afterwards told him.
"Should you prefer being thought a very
reckless girl?" she demanded.

" Gracious !" exclaimed Daisy. She
looked again at Mr. Giovanelli, then she
turned to Winterbourne. There was a
little pink flush in her cheek ; she was
tremendously pretty. " Does Mr. Win-
terbourne think," she asked slowly, smil-
ing, throwing back her head and glancing
at him from head to foot, " that, to save
my reputation, I ought to get into the
carriage ?"

Winterbourne colored ; for an instant
he hesitated greatly. It seemed so strange
to hear her speak that way of her " repu-
tation." But he himself, in fact, must
speak in accordance with gallantry. The
finest gallantry here was simply to tell
her the truth, and the truth for Winter-
bourne — as the few indications I have
been able to give have made him known
to the reader — was that Daisy Miller
should take Mrs. Walker's advice. He

looked at her exquisite prettiness, and
then said, very gently, " I think you should
get into the carriage."

Daisy gave a violent laugh. " I never
heard anything so stiff! If this is im-
proper, Mrs. Walker," she pursued, "then
I arn all improper, and you must give
me up. Good-bye ; I hope you'll have a
lovely ride!" and, with Mr. Giovanelli,
who made a triumphantly obsequious sa-
lute, she turned away.

Mrs. Walker sat looking after her, and
there were tears in Mrs. Walker's eyes.
" Get in here, sir," she said to Winter-
bourne, indicating the place beside her.
The young man answered that he felt
bound to accompany Miss Miller ; where-
upon Mrs. Walker declared that if he re-
fused her this favor she would never
speak to him again. She was evidently
in earnest. Winterbourne overtook Daisy
and her companion, and, offering the young
girl his hand, told her that Mrs. Walker
had made an imperious claim upon his
society. He expected that in answer she
would say something rather free, some-
thing to commit herself still further to
that "recklessness" from which Mrs.
Walker had so charitably endeavored to

dissuade her. But she only shook his
hand, hardly looking at him ; while Mr.
Giovanelli bade him farewell with a too
emphatic flourish of the hat.

Winterbourne was not in the best pos-
sible humor as he took his seat in Mrs.
Walker's victoria. " That was not clever
of you," he said, candidly, while the vehi-
cle mingled again with the throng of car-
riages.

"In such a case," his companion an-
swered, " I don't wish to be clever ; I
wish to be earnest /"

" Well, your earnestness lias only of-
fended her and put her off."

" It has happened very well," said Mrs.
Walker. "If she is so perfectly deter-
mined to compromise herself, the sooner
one knows it the better; one can act ac-
cordingly."

" I suspect she meant no harm," Win-
terbourne rejoined.

" So I thought a month ago. But she
has been going too far."

"What has she been doing?"

"Everything that is not done here.
Flirting with any man she could pick
up ; sitting in corners with mysterious
Italians; dancing all the evening with

the same partners ; receiving visits at
eleven o'clock at night. Her mother
goes away when visitors come."

" But her brother," said Winterbonrne,
laughing, " sits up till midnight."

" He must be edified by what he sees.
I'm told that at their hotel every one is
talking about her, and that a smile goes
round among all the servants when a gen-
tleman comes and asks for Miss Miller."

" The servants be hanged !" said Win-
terbourne, angrily. " The poor girl's only
fault," he presently added, " is that she
is very uncultivated."

" She is naturally indelicate," Mrs.
"Walker declared. "Take that example
this morning. How long had you known
her at Yevay ?"

"A couple of days."
" Fancy, then, her making it a
personal matter that you should
have left the place !"
Winterbonrne was silent for some
moments; then he said, "I suspect,
Mrs. Walker, that you and I have lived
too long at Geneva!" And he added a
request that she should inform him with
what particular design she had made
him enter her carriage.

u I wished to beg you to cease your re-
lations with Miss Miller — not to flirt with
her — to give her no further opportunity
to expose herself — to let her alone, in
short."

" I'm afraid I can't do that," said Win-
terbourne. " I like her extremely."

" All the more reason that you shouldn't
help her to make a scandal."

" There shall be nothing scandalous in
my attentions to her."

"There certainly will be in the way
she takes them. But I have said what I
had on my conscience," Mrs. Walker pur-
sued. " If you wish to rejoin the young
lady I will put you down. Here, by-the-
way, you have a chance."

The carriage was traversing that part
of the Pincian Garden that overhangs the
wall of Rome and overlooks the beautiful
Villa Borghese. It is bordered by a
large parapet, near which there are sev-
eral seats. One of the seats at a distance
was occupied by a gentleman and a lady,
towards whom Mrs. Walker gave a toss
of her head. At the same moment these
persons rose and walked towards the par-
apet. Winterbourne had asked the coach-
man to stop ; he now descended from

the carriage. His companion looked at
him a moment in silence ; then, while he
raised his hat, she drove majestically
away. Winterbourne stood there ; he had
turned his eyes towards Daisy and her
cavalier. They evidently saw no one;
they were too deeply occupied with each
other. When they reached the low gar-
den-wall they stood a moment looking off
at the great flat-topped pine-clusters of
the Villa Borghese ; then Giovanelli seated
himself familiarly upon the broad ledge
of the wall. The western sun in the op-
posite sky sent out a brilliant shaft through
a couple of cloud-bars, whereupon Daisy's
companion took her parasol out of her
hands and opened it. She came a little
nearer, and he held the parasol over her ;
then, still holding it, he let it rest upon
her shoulder, so that both of their heads
were hidden from Winterbourne. This
young man lingered a moment, then he
began to walk. But he walked — not
towards the couple with the parasol—
towards the residence of his aunt, Mrs.
Costello.

He flattered himself on the following
day that there was no smiling among the
servants when he, at least, asked for Mrs.

Miller at her hotel. This lady and her
daughter, however, were not at home ;
and on the next day after, repeating his
visit, Winterbourne again had the mis-
fortune not to find them. Mrs. Walker's
party took place on the evening of the
third day, and, in spite of the frigidity
of his last interview with the hostess,
Winterbourne was among the guests.
Mrs. Walker was one of those American
ladies who, while residing abroad, make a
point, in their own phrase, of studying
European society ; and she had on this
occasion collected several specimens of
her diversely-born fellow-mortals to serve,
as it were, as text-books. When Winter-
borne arrived, Daisy Miller was not there,
but in a few moments he saw her mother
come in alone, very shyly and ruefully.
Mrs. Miller's hair above her exposed-
looking temples was more frizzled than
ever. As she approached Mrs. Walker,
Winterbourne also drew near.

" You see I've come all alone," said
poor Mrs. Miller. " I'm so frightened
I don't know what to do. It's the first
time I've ever been to a party alone, es-
pecially in this country. I wanted to
bring Randolph, or Eugenio, or some one,

but Daisy just pushed me off by myself.
I ain't used to going round alone."

"And does not your daughter intend
to favor us with her society ?" demanded
Mrs. Walker, impressively.

"Well, Daisy's all dressed," said Mrs.
Miller, with that accent of the dispassion-
ate, if not of the philosophic, historian
with which she always recorded the cur-
rent incidents of her daughter's career.
" She got dressed on purpose before din-
ner. But she's got a friend of hers there;
that gentleman — the Italian — that she
wanted to bring. They've got going at
the piano; it seems as if they couldn't
leave off. Mr. Giovanelli sings splendid-
ly. But I guess they'll come before very
long," concluded Mrs. Miller, hopefully.

"I'm sorry she should come in that
way," said Mrs. Walker.

" Well, I told her that there was no
use in her getting dressed before dinner
if she was going to wait three hours," re-
sponded Daisy's mamma. " I didn't see
the use of her putting on such a dress as
that to sit round with Mr. Giovanelli."

" This is most horrible !" said Mrs.
Walker, turning away and addressing her-
self to Winterbourne. "Elles'affiche. It's

her revenge for my having ventured
to remonstrate with her. When she
comes I shall not speak to her."

Daisy came after eleven o'clock ;
but she was not, on such an occasion,
a young lady to wait to be spoken to.
She rustled forward in radiant loveli-
ness, smiling and chattering, carrying
a large bouquet, and attended by Mr.
Giovanelli. Every one stopped talk-
ing, and turned and looked at her.
She came straight to Mrs. Walker.
" I'm afraid you thought I never was
coming, so I sent mother off to tell
you. I wanted to make Mr. Giova-
nelli practise some things before he
came ; you know he sings beautifully,
and I want you to ask him to sing.
This is Mr. Giovanelli ; you know I
introduced him to you ; he's got the
most lovely voice, and he knows the
most charming set of songs. I made
him go over them this evening on pur-
pose ; we had the greatest time at the
hotel." Of all this Daisy delivered
herself with the sweetest, brightest

audibleness, looking now at her host-

ess and now round the room, while she
gave a series of little pats round her
shoulders to the edges of her dress. " Is
there any one I know ?" she asked.

" I think every one knows you !" said
Mrs. Walker, pregnantly, and she gave a
very cursory greeting to Mr. Giovanelli.
This gentleman bore himself gallantly.
He smiled and bowed, and showed his
white teeth ; he curled his mustaches and
rolled his eyes, and performed all the
proper functions of a handsome Italian
at an evening party. He sang very pret-
tily half a dozen songs, though Mrs.
Walker afterwards declared that she had
been quite unable to find out who asked
him. It was apparently not Daisy who
had given him his orders. Daisy sat at a
distance from the piano ; and though she
had publicly, as it were, professed a high
admiration for his singing, talked, not in-
audibly, while it was going on.

" It's a pity these rooms are so small ;
we can't dance," she said to Winter-
bourne, as if she had seen him five min-
utes before.

" I am not sorry we can't dance," Win-
terbourne answered ; " I don't dance."

" Of course you don't dance ; you're

too stiff," said Miss Daisy. " I hope you
enjoyed your drive with Mrs. AValker !"

"No, I didn't enjoy it; I preferred
walking with you."

" We paired off; that was much better,"
said Daisy. " But did you ever hear any-
thing so cool as Mrs. Walker's wanting
me to get into her carriage and drop poor
Mr. Giovanelli, and under the pretext
that it was proper ? People have differ-
ent ideas ! It would have been most un-
kind; he had been talking about that
walk for ten days."

"He should not have talked about it
at all," said Winterbourne ; " he would
never have proposed to a young lady of
this country to walk about the streets
with him."

" About the streets ?" cried Daisy, with
her pretty stare. " Where, then, would
he have proposed to her to walk? The
Pincio is not the streets, either; and I,
thank goodness, am not a young lady of
this country. The young ladies of this
country have a dreadfully poky time of
it, so far as I can learn ; I don't see why
I should change my habits for them"

" 1 am afraid your habits are those of
a flirt," said Winterbourne, gravely.

" Of course they are," she cried, giving
him her little smiling stare again. " I'm
a fearful, frightful flirt ! Did you ever
hear of a nice girl that was not ? But I
suppose you will tell me now that I am
not a nice girl."

" You're a very nice girl ; but I wish
you would flirt with me, and me only,"
said Winterbourne.

" Ah ! thank you — thank you very
much ; you are the last man I should
think of flirting with. As I have had
the pleasure of informing you, you are
too stiff."

100

" You say that too often," said Winter-
bounie.

Daisy gave a delighted laugh. " If I
could have the sweet hope of making you
angry, I should say it again."

" Don't do that ; when I am angry I'm
stiffer than ever. But if you won't flirt
with me, do cease, at least, to flirt with
your friend at the piano ; they don't
understand that sort of thing here."

u I thought they understood nothing
else !" exclaimed Daisy.

" Not in young unmarried women."

" It seems to me much more proper in
young unmarried women than in old mar-
ried ones," Daisy declared.

"Well," said Winterbourne, "when
you deal with natives you must go by the
custom of the place. Flirting is a purely
American custom ; it doesn't exist here.
So when you show yourself in public
with Mr. Giovanelli, and without your
mother —

" Gracious ! poor mother !" interposed
Daisy.

" Though you may be flirting, Mr.
Giovanelli is not ; he means something
else."

" He isn't preaching, at any rate," said
101

Daisy, with vivacity. " And if yon want
very much to know, we are neither of us
flirting ; we are too good friends for that :
we are very intimate friends."

" All !" rejoined Winterbourne, u if yon
are in love with each other, it is another
affair."

She had allowed him up to this point
to talk so frankly that he had no expec-
tation of shocking her by this ejacula-
tion ; but she immediately got up, blush-
ing visibly, and leaving him to exclaim
mentally that little American flirts were
the queerest creatures in the world. " Mr.
Giovanelli, at least," she said, giving her
interlocutor a single glance, " never says
such very disagreeable things to me."

Winterbourne was bewildered ; he stood
staring. Mr. Giovanelli had finished sing-
ing. He left the piano and came over to
Daisy. " Won't you come into the other
room and have some tea?" he asked,
bending before her with his ornamental
smile.

Daisy turned to Winterbourne, begin-
ning to smile again. He was still more
perplexed, for this inconsequent smile
made nothing clear, though it seemed to
prove, indeed, that she had a sweetness

102

and softness that reverted instinctively to
the pardon of offences. "It has never
occurred to Mr. Winterbourne to offer
me any tea," she said, with her little tor-
menting manner.

" I have offered you advice," Winter-
bourne rejoined.

" I prefer weak tea !" cried Daisy, and
she went off with the brilliant Giovanelli.
She sat with him in the adjoining room,
in the embrasure of the window, for the
rest of the evening. There was an in-
teresting performance at the piano, but
neither of these young people gave heed
to it. When Daisy came to take leave of
Mrs. Walker, this lady conscientiously
repaired the weakness of which she had
been guilty at the moment of the young
girl's arrival. She turned her back straight
upon Miss Miller, and left her to depart
with what grace she might. Winter-
bourne was standing near the door; he
saw it all. Daisy turned very pale, and
looked at her mother; but Mrs. Miller
was humbly unconscious of any violation
of the usual social forms. She appeared,
indeed, to have felt an incongruous im-
pulse to draw attention to her own striking
observance of them. " Good-night, Mrs.

Walker," she said; "we've had a beauti-
ful evening. You see, if I let Daisy come
to parties without me, I don't want her
to go away without me." Daisy turned
away, looking with a pale, grave face at
the circle near the door; Winterbourne
saw that, for the first moment, she was
too much shocked and puzzled even for
indignation. He on his side was greatly
touched.

" That was very cruel," he said to Mrs.
Walker.

"She never enters my drawing-room
again !" replied his hostess.

Since Winterbourne was not to meet
her in Mrs. Walker's drawing-room, he
went as often as possible to Mrs. Miller's
hotel. The ladies were rarely at home ;
but when he found them the devoted
Giovanelli was always present. Yery
often the brilliant little Eoman was in
the drawing-room with Daisy alone, Mrs.
Miller being apparently constantly of the
opinion that discretion is the better part
of surveillance. Winterbourne rioted, at
first with surprise, that Daisy on these
occasions was never embarrassed or an-
noyed by his own entrance ; but he very
presently began to feel that she had no

104

more surprises for him ; the unexpected
in her behavior was the only thing to ex-
pect. She showed no displeasure at her
tete-a-tete with Giovanelli being inter-
rupted ; she could chatter as freshly and
freely with two gentlemen as with one;
there was always, in her conversation, the
panie odd mixture of audacity and pue-
rility. Winterbourne remarked to him-
self that if she was seriously interested in
Giovanelli, it was very singular that she
should not take more trouble to preserve
the sanctity of their interviews ; and he
liked her the more for her innocent-look-
ing indifference and her apparently inex-
haustible good-humor. He could hardly
have said why, but she seemed to him a
girl who would never be jealous. At
the risk of exciting a somewhat derisive
smile on the reader's part, I may affirm
that with regard to the women who had
hitherto interested him, it very often
seemed to Winterbourne among the possi-
bilities that, given certain contingencies,
he should be afraid — literally afraid — of
these ladies ; he had a pleasant sense that
he should never be afraid of Daisy Miller.
It must be added that this sentiment was
not altogether flattering to Daisy ; it was

105

part of his conviction, or rather of
his apprehension, that she would
prove a very light young person.
But she was evidently very
much interested in Giovanelli.
She looked at him whenever he
spoke ; she was perpetually tell-
ing him to do this and to do that ;
she was constantly " chaffing " and
abusing him. She appeared com-
pletely to have forgotten that
Winterbourne had said anything
to displease her at Mrs. Walker's
little party. One Sunday after-
noon, having gone to St. Peter's
with his aunt, Winterbourne per-
ceived Daisy strolling about the
great church in company
with the inevitable Giova-
nelli. Presently he point-
ed out the young girl and
her cavalier to Mrs. Costel-
lo. This lady looked at them a moment
through her eye-glass, and then she said,
" That's what makes yon so pensive in
these days, eh ?"

106

kt I had not the least idea I was pen-
sive," said the young man.

" You are very much preoccupied ; you
are thinking of something."

" And what is it," he asked, " that you
accuse me of thinking of T

" Of that young lady's — Miss Baker's,
Miss Chandler's — what's her name ?—
Miss Miller's intrigue with that little bar-
ber's block."

'' Do you call it an intrigue," Winter-
bourne asked — "an affair that goes on
with such peculiar publicity?"

" That's their folly," said Mrs. Costello;
" it's not their merit."

" No," rejoined Winterbourne, with
something of that pensiveness to which
his aunt had alluded. "I don't believe
that there is anything to be called an
intrigue."

" I have heard a dozen people speak of
it ; they say she is quite carried away by
him."

" They are certainly very intimate,"
said Winterbourne.

Mrs. Costello inspected the young
couple again with her optical instrument.
" He is very handsome. One easily sees
how it is. She thinks him the most ele-

107

gant man in the world — the finest gentle-
man. She has never seen anything like
him ; he is better, even, than the courier.
It was the courier, probably, who intro-
duced him ; and if he succeeds in marrying
the young lady, the courier will come in
for a magnificent commission."

" I don't believe she thinks of marrying
him," said Winterbourne, " and I don't
believe he hopes to marry her."

" You may be very sure she thinks of
nothing. She goes on from day to day,
from hour to hour, as they did in the
Golden Age. I can imagine nothing more
vulgar. And at the same time," added
Mrs. Costello, " depend upon it that she
may tell you any moment that she is
' engaged.' ':

" I think that is more than Giovanelli
expects," said Winterbourne.

" Who is Giovanelli ?"

" The little Italian. I have asked ques-
tions about him, and learned something.
He is apparently a perfectly respect-
able little man. I believe he is, in a
small way, a cavaliere avvocato. But he
doesn't move in what are called the first
circles. I think it is really not absolutely
impossible that the courier introduced

108

him. He is evidently immensely
charmed with Miss Miller. If
she thinks him the finest gen-
tleman in the world, he, on his
side, has never found himself in per-
sonal contact with such splendor,
such opulence, such expensiveness,
as this young lady's. And then she
must seem to him wonderfully pret-
ty and interesting. I rather doubt
that he dreams of marrying her.
That must appear to him too im-
possible a piece of luck. He has
nothing but his handsome face to
offer, and there is a substantial Mr.
Miller in that mysterious land of
dollars. Giovanelli knows that he
hasn't a title to offer. If he were
only a count or a marchese ! He

must wonder at his luck, at the way they
have taken him up."

" He accounts for it by his handsome
face, and thinks Miss Miller a young lady
qui se passe ses fantaisies /" said Mrs.
Costello.

" It is very true," Winterbourne pur-
sued, " that Daisy and her mamma have
not yet risen to that stage of — what shall
I call it ? — of culture, at which the idea
of catching a count or a marchese begins.
I believe that they are intellectually in-
capable of that conception."

•"Ah! but the avvocato can't believe
it," said Mrs. Costello.

Of the observation excited by Daisy's
"intrigue," Winterbourne gathered that
day at St. Peter's sufficient evidence. A
dozen of the American colonists in Rome
came to talk with Mrs. Costello, who sat
on a little portable stool at the base of
one of the great pilasters. The vesper
service was going forward in splendid
chants and organ -tones in the adjacent
choir, and meanwhile, between Mrs. Cos-
tello and her friends, there was a great
deal said about poor little Miss Miller's
going really " too far." Winterbourne
was not pleased with what he heard ; but

112

when, coming out upon the great steps
of the church, he saw Daisy, who had
emerged before him, get into an open
cab with her accomplice and roll away
through the cynical streets of Rome, he
could not deny to himself that she was
going very far indeed. He felt very
sorry for her — not exactly that he be-
lieved that she had completely lost her
head, but because it was painful to hear
so much that was pretty and undefended
and natural assigned to a vulgar place
among the categories of disorder. He
made an attempt after this to give a hint
to Mrs. Miller. He met one day in the
Corso a friend, a tourist like himself, who
had just come out of the Doria Palace,
where he had been walking through the
beautiful gallery. His friend talked for
a moment about the superb portrait of
Innocent X., by Velasquez, which hangs
in one of the cabinets of the palace, and
then said, " And in the same cabinet, by-
the-way, I had the pleasure of contem-
plating a picture of a different kind — that
pretty American girl whom you pointed
out to me last week." In answer to
Winterbourne's inquiries, his friend nar-
rated that the pretty American girl —

113

prettier than ever — was seated with a
companion in the secluded nook in which
the great papal portrait was enshrined.

" Who was her companion ?" asked
Winterbourne.

"A little Italian with a bouquet in his
button-hole. The girl is delightfully pret-
ty ; but I thought I understood from you
the other day that she was a young lady
du meitteur monde"

"So she is!" answered Winterbourne;
and having assured himself that his in-
formant had seen Daisy and her compan-
ion but five minutes before, he jumped
into a cab and went to call on Mrs. Miller.
She was at home ; but she apologized to
him for receiving him in Daisy's absence.

"She's gone out somewhere with Mr.
Giovanelli," said Mrs. Miller. " She's al-
ways going round with Mr. Giovanelli."

" I have noticed that they are very in-
timate," Winterbourne observed.

" Oh, it seems as if they couldn't live
without each other!" said Mrs. Miller.
" Well, he's a real gentleman, anyhow. I
keep telling Daisy she's engaged !"

" And what does Daisy say?"

" Oh, she says she isn't engaged. But
she might as well be!" this impartial

arent resumed ; " she goes on as if she
| was. But I've made Mr. Giovanelli
promise to tell me, if she doesn't. I
should want to write to Mr. Miller
about it — shouldn't you?"

Winterbourne replied that he cer-
tainly should ; and the state of mind
of Daisy's mamma struck him as so
unprecedented in the annals of parent-
al vigilance that he gave up as utterly
irrelevant the attempt to place her
upon her guard.

After this Daisy was never at home,
and Winterbourne ceased to meet her
at the houses of their common acquaint-
ances, because, as he perceived, these
shrewd people had quite made up their
minds that she was going too far. They
ceased to invite her; and they intimat-
ed that they desired to express to ob-
servant Europeans the great truth that,
though Miss Daisy Miller was a young
American lady, her behavior was not
representative — was regarded by her
compatriots as abnormal. Winter-
bourne wondered how she felt about
all the cold shoulders that were turned
towards her, and sometimes it annoyed

him to suspect that she did not feel at
all. He said to himself that she was too
light and childish, too uncultivated and
unreasoning, too provincial, to have re-
flected upon her ostracism, or even to
have perceived it. Then at other mo-
ments he believed that she carried about
in her elegant and irresponsible little or-
ganism a defiant, passionate, perfectly ob-
servant consciousness of the impression
she produced. He asked himself whether
Daisy's defiance carne from the conscious-
ness of innocence, or from her being, es-
sentially, a young person of the reckless
class. It must be admitted that holding
one's self to a belief in Daisy's "inno-
cence" came to seem to Winterbourne
more and more a matter of fine-spun gal-
lantry. As I have already had occasion
to relate, he was angry at finding him-
self reduced to chopping logic about
this young lady ; he was vexed at his
want of instinctive certitude as to how
far her eccentricities were generic, na-
tional, and how far they were personal.
From either view of them he had some-
how missed her, and now it was too late.
She was "carried away" by Mr. Giova-
nelli.

116

A few clays after his brief interview
with her mother, he encountered her in
that beautiful abode of flowering desola-
tion known as the Palace of the Caesars.
The early Roman spring had filled the air
with bloom and perfume, and the rugged
surface of the Palatine was muffled with
tender verdure. Daisy was strolling along
the top of one of those great mounds of
ruin that are embanked with mossy mar-
ble and paved with monumental inscrip-
tions. It seemed to him that Rome had
never been so lovely as just then. He
stood looking off at the enchanting har-
mony of line and color that remotely en-
circles the city, inhaling the softly humid
odors, and feeling the freshness of the
year and the antiquity of the place reaf-
firm themselves in mysterious interfusion.
It seemed to him, also, that Daisy had
never looked so pretty ; but this had been
an observation of his whenever he met
her. Giovanelli was at her side, and Gio-
vanelli, too, wore an aspect of even un-
wonted brilliancy.

" Well," said Daisy, " I should think
you would be lonesome !"

" Lonesome ?" asked Winterbourne.

" You are always going round by your-

117

self. Can't you get any one to walk with
you?"

" I am not so fortunate," said Winter-
bourne, " as your companion."

Giovanelli, from the first, had treated
Winterbourne with distinguished polite-
ness. He listened with a deferential air
to his remarks ; he laughed punctiliously
at his pleasantries ; he seemed disposed
to testify to his belief that Winterbourne
was a superior young man. He carried
himself in no degree like a jealous wooer ;
he had obviously a great deal of tact ; he
had no objection to your expecting a lit-
tle humility of him. It even seemed to
Winterbourne at times that Giovanelli
would find a certain mental relief in be-
ing able to have a private understanding
with him — to say to him, as an intelligent
man, that, bless you, he knew how extraor-
dinary was this young lady, and didn't
flatter himself with delusive — or, at least,
too delusive — hopes of matrimony and
dollars. On this occasion he strolled away
from his companion to pluck a sprig of
almond-blossom, which he carefully ar-
ranged in his button-hole.

" I know why you say that," said Daisy,
watching Giovanelli. " Because you think

118

I go round too much with him" And
she nodded at her attendant.

" Every one thinks so — if you care
to know," said Winterbourne.

"Of course I care to know!" Daisy
exclaimed, seriously. " But I don't
believe it. They are only pretending
to be shocked. They don't really care
a straw what I do. Besides, I don't
go round so much."

" I think you will find they do care.
They will show it disagreeably."

Daisy looked at him a moment.
"How disagreeably?"

"Haven't you noticed anything?"
Winterbourne asked.

"I have noticed you. But I no-
ticed you were as stiff as an umbrella
the first time I saw you."

"You will find I am not so stiff as
several others," said Winterbourne,
smiling.

"How shall I find it?"

" By going to see the others."

" What will they do to me ?"

" They will give you the cold shoul-
der. Do you know what that means ?"

Daisy was looking at him intently;
she began to color.

" Do you mean as Mrs. Walker did the
other night ?"

" Exactly !" said Winterbourne.

She looked away at Giovanelli, who
was decorating himself with his almond-
blossom. Then, looking back at Winter-
bourne, " I shouldn't think you would let
people be so unkind !" she said.

" How can I help it ?" he asked.

" I should think you would say some-
thing."

" I did say something ;" and he paused
a moment. "I say that your mother tells
me that she believes you are engaged."

"Well, she does," said Daisy, very
simply.

Winterbonrne began to laugh. "And
does Randolph believe it?" he asked.

" I guess Randolph doesn't believe any-
thing," said Daisy. Randolph's scepti-
cism excited Winterbonrne to further
hilarity, and he observed that Giovanelli
was coming back to them. Daisy, ob-
serving it too, addressed herself again to
her countryman. " Since you have men-
tioned it," she said, " I am engaged." . . .
Winterbourne looked at her; he had
stopped laughing. "You don't believe

it !" she added.

120

He was silent a moment ; and then,
" Yes, I believe it," he said.

" Oh no, you don't !" she answered.
" Well, then— I am not !"

The young girl and her cicerone were
on their way to the gate of the enclosure,
so that Winterbourne, who had but lately
entered, presently took leave of them.
A week afterwards he went to dine at a
beautiful villa on the Caelian Hill, and,
on arriving, dismissed his hired vehicle.
The evening was charming, and he prom-
ised himself the satisfaction of walking
home beneath the Arch of Constantine
and past the vaguely-lighted monuments
of the Forurn. There was a waning moon
in the sky, and her radiance was not brill-
iant, but she was veiled in a thin cloud-
curtain which seemed to diffuse and equal-
ize it. When, on his return from the
villa (it was eleven o'clock), Winterbourne
approached the dusky circle of the Col-
osseum, it occurred to him, as a lover of
the picturesque, that the interior, in the
pale moonshine, would be well worth a
glance. He turned aside and walked to
one of the empty arches, near which, as
he observed, an open carriage — one of

the little Roman street-cabs — was sta-
121

tioned. Then he passed in, among the
cavernous shadows of the great structure,
and emerged upon the clear and silent
arena. The place had never seemed to
him more impressive. One-half of the
gigantic circus was in deep shade, the

other was sleeping in the luminous dusk.
As he stood there he began to murmur
Byron's famous lines, out of "Manfred ;"
but before he had finished his quotation
he remembered that if nocturnal medita-
tions in the Colosseum are recommended
by the poets, they are deprecated by the
doctors. The historic atmosphere was
there, certainly ; but the historic atmos-
phere, scientifically considered, was no
better than a villanous miasma. Winter-
bourne walked to the middle of the arena,
to take a more general glance, intending
thereafter to make a hasty retreat. The
great cross in the centre was covered with
shadow ; it was only as he drew near it that
he made it out distinctly. Then he saw
that two persons were stationed upon the
low steps which formed its base. One of
these was a woman, seated ; her compan-
ion was standing in front of her.

Presently the sound of the woman's
voice came to him distinctly in the warm
night air. "Well, he looks at us as one
of the old lions or tigers may have looked
at the Christian martyrs!" These were
the words he heard, in the familiar accent
of Miss Daisy Miller.

"Let us hope he is not very hungry,"

123

responded the ingenious Giovanelli. " He
will have to take me first ; you will serve
for dessert !"

Winterbourne stopped, with a sort of
horror, and, it must be added, with a sort
of relief. It was as if a sudden illumina-
tion had been flashed upon the ambiguity
of Daisy's behavior, and the riddle had
become easy to read. She was a young
lady whom a gentleman need no longer
be at pains to respect. He stood there
looking at her — looking at her compan-
ion, and not reflecting that though he saw
them vaguely, he himself must have been
more brightly visible. He felt angry
with himself that he had bothered so
much about the right way of regarding
Miss Daisy Miller. Then, as he was go-
ing to advance again, he checked himself ;
not from the fear that he was doing her
injustice, but from the sense of the dan-
ger of appearing unbecomingly exhila-
rated by this sudden revulsion from cau-
tious criticism. He turned away towards
the entrance of the place, but, as he did
so, he heard Daisy speak again.

" Why, it was Mr. Winterbourne ! He
saw me, and he cuts me !"

What a clever little reprobate she was,

124

•

and how smartly she played at injured
innocence ! But he wouldn't cut her.
AVinterbourne came forward again, and
went towards the great cross. Daisy had
got up ; Giovanelli lifted his hat. Win-
terbourne had now begun to think simply
of the craziness, from a sanitary point of
view, of a delicate young girl lounging
away the evening in this nest of malaria.
What if she were a clever little rep-
robate? that was no reason for her dying
of the perniciosa. " How long have
you been here ?" he asked, almost
brutally.

Daisy, lovely in the flattering moon-
light, looked at him a moment. Then
— "All the evening," she answered,
gently. ..." I never saw anything so
pretty."

"I am afraid," said Win-
terbourne, " that you will not
think Roman fever very pret-
ty. This is the way people
catch it. I wonder," he added,
turning to Giovanelli, "that

you, a native Roman, should countenance
such a terrible indiscretion."

" Ah," said the handsome native, " for
myself I am not afraid."

" Neither am I — for you! I am speak-
ing for this young lady."

Giovanelli lifted his well-shaped eye-
brows and showed his brilliant teeth. But
he took Winterbourne's rebuke with do-
cility. "I told the signorina it was a
grave indiscretion ; but when was the sign-
orina ever prudent?"

"I never was sick, and I don't mean to
be !" the signorina declared. " I don't
look like much, but I'm healthy ! I was
bound to see the Colosseum by moonlight ;
I shouldn't have wanted to go home with-
out that ; and we have had the most beau-
tiful time, haven't we, Mr. Giovanelli ? If
there has been any danger, Eugenio can
give me some pills. He has got some
splendid pills."

" I should advise you," said Winter-
bourne, "to drive home as fast as possi-
ble and take one !"

"What you say is very wise," Giova-
nelli rejoined. "I will go and make sure
the carriage is at hand." And he went
forward rapidly.

126

Daisy followed with Winterbourne.
He kept looking at her ; she seemed
not in the least embarrassed. Win-
terbourne said nothing ; Daisy chat-
tered about the beauty of the place.
" Well, I have seen the Colosseum by
moonlight !" she exclaimed. "That's
one good thing." Then, noticing
Winterbonrne's silence, she asked
him why he didn't speak. He made
no answer ; he only began to laugh.
They passed under one of the dark
archways; Giovanelli was in front
with the carriage. Here Daisy
stopped a moment, looking at the
young American. "Did you believe
I was engaged the other day?" she
asked.

" It doesn't matter what I be-
lieved the other day," said
Winterbourne,still laughing. _ ^'

" Well, what do you be-
lieve now?"

" I believe that it makes very lit-
tle difference whether you are en-
gaged or not!"

He felt the young girl's pretty eyes
fixed upon him through the thick gloom
of the archway; she was apparently go-
ing to answer. But Giovanelli hurried
her forward. " Quick ! quick !" he said ;
"if we get in by midnight we are quite
safe."

Daisy took her seat in the carriage, and
the fortunate Italian placed himself be-
side her. " Don't forget Eugenie's pills !"
said Winterbourne, as he lifted his hat.

" I don't care," said Daisy, in a little
strange tone, " whether I have Roman
fever or not !" Upon this the cab-driver
cracked his whip, and they rolled away
over the desultory patches of the antique
pavement.

Winterbourne, to do him justice, as it
were, mentioned to no one that he had
encountered Miss Miller, at midnight, in
the Colosseum with a gentleman ; but,
nevertheless, a couple of days later, the
fact of her having been there under these
circumstances was known to every mem-
ber of the little American circle, and com-
mented accordingly. Winterbourne re-
flected that they had of course known it
at the hotel, and that, after Daisy's return,
there had been an exchange of remarks

128

between the porter and the cab-driver.
But the young man was conscious, at the
same moment, that it had ceased to be a
matter of serious regret to him that the
little American flirt should be "talked
about" by low-minded menials. These
people, a day or two later, had serious in-
formation to give : the little American
flirt was alarmingly ill. Winterbourne,
when the rumor came to him, immedi-
ately went to the hotel for more news.
He found that two or three charitable
friends had preceded him, and that they
were being entertained in Mrs. Miller's
salon by Randolph.

" It's going round at night," said Ran-
dolph— " that's what made her sick. She's
always going round at night. I shouldn't
think she'd want to, it's so plaguy dark.
You can't see anything here at night, ex-
cept when there's a moon ! In America
there's always a moon !" Mrs. Miller was
invisible ; she was now, at least, giving
her daughter the advantage of her society.
It was evident that Daisy was dangerous-
ly ill.

Winterbourne went often to ask for
news of her, and once he saw Mrs. Miller,
who, though deeply alarmed, was, rather

129

to his surprise, perfectly composed, and,
as it appeared, a most efficient and judi-
cious nurse. She talked a good deal about
Dr. Davis, but Winterbourne paid her the
compliment of saying to himself that she
was not, after all, such a monstrous goose.
" Daisy spoke of you the other day," she
said to him. "Half the time she doesn't
know what she's saying, but that time I
think she did. She gave me a message.
She told me to tell you — she told me to
tell you that she never was engaged to
that handsome Italian. I am sure I am
very glad. Mr. Giovanelli hasn't been
near us since she was taken ill. I thought
he was so much of a gentleman ; but I
don't call that very polite ! A lady told
me that he was afraid I was angry with
him for taking Daisy round at night.
Well, so I am ; but I suppose he knows
I'm a lady. I would scorn to scold him.
Anyway, she says she's not engaged. I
don't know why she wanted you to know ;
but she said to me three times, 'Mind
you tell Mr. Winterbourne.' And then
she told me to ask if you remembered
the time you went to that castle in Switz-
erland. But I said I wouldn't give any
such messages as that. Only, if she is

130

not engaged, I'm sure I'm glad to know
it."

But, as AVinterbourne had said, it mat-
tered very little. A week after this the
poor girl died ; it had been a terrible case
of the fever. Daisy's grave was in the
little Protestant cemetery, in an angle of
the wall of imperial Rome, beneath the
cypresses and the thick spring -flowers.
Wiiiterbourne stood there beside it, with

a number of other mourners — a number
larger than the scandal excited by the
young lady's career would have led you
to expect. Near him stood Giovanelli,
who came nearer still before Winterbourne
turned away. Giovanelli was very pale :
on this occasion he had no flower in his
button-hole ; he seemed to wish to say
something. At last he said, "She was
the most beautiful young lady I ever
saw, and the most amiable ;" and then he
added in a moment, "and she was the
most innocent."

Winterbourne looked at him, and pres-
ently repeated his wrords, " And the most
innocent ?"

" The most innocent !"

Winterbourne felt sore and angry.
"Why the devil," he asked, "did you
take her to that fatal place ?"

Mr. Giovanelli's urbanity was appar-
ently imperturbable. He looked on the
ground a moment, and then he said, " For
myself I had no fear ; and she wanted to
go."

" That was no reason !" Winterbourne
declared.

The subtle Roman again dropped his
eyes. "If she had lived, I should have

132

got nothing. She would never have mar-
ried me, I am sure."

" She would never have married you ?"

" For a moment I hoped so. But no.
I am sure."

Winterbourne listened to him : he stood
staring at the raw protuberance among
the April daisies. When ho turned away
again, Mr. Giovanelli with his light, slow
step, had retired.

Winterbourne almost immediately left
Rome ; but the following summer he
again met his aunt, Mrs. Costello, at Ve-
vay. Mrs. Costello was fond of Yevay.
In the interval Winterbourne had often
thought of Daisy Miller and her mystify-
ing manners. One day he spoke of her to
his aunt — said it was on his conscience
that he had done her injustice.

"I am sure I don't know," said Mrs.
Costello. " How did your injustice affect
her?"

"She sent me a message before her
death which I didn't understand at the
time ; but I have understood it since. She
would have appreciated one's esteem."

"Is that a modest way," asked Mrs.
Costello, " of saying that she would have
reciprocated one's affection ?"

Winterbourne offered no answer to this
question ; but he presently said, " You
were right in that remark that you made
last summer. I was booked to make a
mistake. I have lived too long in foreign
parts."

Nevertheless, he went back to live at
Geneva, whence there continue to come
the most contradictory accounts of his
motives of sojourn : a report that he is
"studying" hard — an intimation that he
is much interested in a very clever foreign
lady.

Jlart

,OUR years
ago — in

1S74 — two young
Englishmen Lad oc-
casion to go to the
United States. They
crossed the ocean at
midsummer, and, ar-
riving in New York on the first day
of August, were much struck with
the fervid temperature of that city.
Disembarking upon the wharf, they
climbed into one of those huge high-
hung coaches which convey passen-
gers to the hotels, and, with a great
deal of bouncing and bumping, took
their course through Broadway. The
midsummer aspect of New
York is not, perhaps, the
most favorable one ; still, it
is not without its pictu-
resque and even brilliant
side. Nothing could well
resemble less a typical Eng-
lish street than the intermi-
nable avenue, rich in incon-
gruities, through which our
two travellers advanced —

looking out on each side of them at the
comfortable animation of the sidewalks,
the high-colored, heterogeneous archi-
tecture, the huge, white marble fa9ades
glittering in the strong, crude light, and
bedizened with gilded lettering, the mul-
tifarious awnings, banners, and streamers,
the extraordinary number of omnibuses,
horse-cars, and other democratic vehicles,
the venders of cooling fluids, the white
trousers and big straw-hats of the police-
men, the tripping gait of the modish young
persons on the pavement, the general
brightness, newness, juvenility, both of
people and things. The young men had
exchanged few observations ; but in cross-
ing Union Square, in front of the monu-
ment to Washington — in the very shadow,
indeed, projected by the image of the
pater patrioe — one of them remarked to
the other, "It seems a rum-looking place."

"Ah, very odd, very odd," said the
other, who was the clever man of the
two.

" Pity it's so beastly hot," resumed the
first speaker, after a pause.

" You know we are in a low latitude,"
said his friend.

" I dare say," remarked the other.

138

" I wonder," said the second
speaker, presently, "if they can
give one a bath ?"

" I dare say not," rejoined the
other.

" Oh, I say !" cried his com-
rade.

This animated discussion was checked
by their arrival at the hotel, which had
been recommended to them by an Amer-
ican gentleman whose acquaintance they
made — with whom, indeed, they became
very intimate — on the steamer, and who
had proposed to accompany them to the
inn and introduce them, in a friendly
way, to the proprietor. This plan, how-
ever, had been defeated by their friend's
finding that his "partner" was await-
ing him on the wharf, and that his
commercial associate desired him in-
stantly to come and give his attention
to certain telegrams received from
St. Louis. But the two English-
men, with nothing but their na-

tional prestige and personal graces to
recommend them, were very well re-
ceived at the hotel, which had an air of
capacious hospitality. They found that
a bath was not unattainable, and were in-
deed struck with the facilities for pro-
longed and reiterated immersion with
which their apartment was supplied. Af-
ter bathing a good deal — more, indeed,
than they had ever done before on a sin-
gle occasion — they made their way into
the dining-room of the hotel, which was
a spacious restaurant, with a fountain in
the middle, a great many tall plants in
ornamental tubs, and an array of French
waiters. The first dinner on land after a
sea-voyage is, under any circumstances, a
delightful occasion, and there was some-
thing particularly agreeable in the circum-
stances in which our young Englishmen
found themselves. They were extremely
good-natured young men ; they were more
ol)servant than they appeared ; in a sort
of inarticulate, accidentally dissimulative
fashion, they were highly appreciative.
This was, perhaps, especially the case with
the elder, who was also, as I have said,
the man of talent. They sat down at a
little table, which was a very different

140

affair from the great clattering seesaw in
the saloon of the steamer. The wide
doors and windows of the restaurant stood
open, beneath large awnings, to a wide
pavement, where there were other plants
in tubs and rows of spreading trees, and
beyond which there was a large, shady
square, without any palings, and with mar-
ble-paved walks. And above the vivid
verdure rose other fagades of white mar-
ble and of pale chocolate-colored stone,
squaring themselves against the deep blue
sky. Here, outside, in the light and the
shade and the heat, there was a great
tinkling of the bells of innumerable street-
cars, and a constant strolling and shuffling
and rustling of many pedestrians, a large
proportion of whom were young women
in Pompadour-looking dresses. Within,
the place was cool and vaguely lighted,
with the plash of water, the odor of
flowers, and the flitting of French wait-
ers, as I have said, upon soundless car-
pets.

" It's rather like Paris, you know," said
the younger of our two travellers.

"It's like Paris — only more so," his
companion rejoined.

"I suppose it's the French waiters,"

141

said the first speaker. " Why don't they
have French waiters in London ?"

"Fancy a French waiter at a club," said
his friend.

The young Englishman stared a little,
as if he could not fancy it. " In Paris
I'm very apt to dine at a place where
there's an English waiter. Don't you
know what's - his - name's, close to the
thingumbob? They always set an Eng-
lish waiter at me. I suppose they think
I can't speak French."

" Well, you can't." And the elder of
the young Englishmen unfolded his
napkin.

His companion took no notice what-
ever of this declaration. "I say," he
resumed, in a moment, " I suppose we
must learn to speak American. I
suppose we must take les-
sons.'

t understand
them," said the clever man.

" What the deuce is he saying ?" asked
his comrade, appealing from the French
waiter.

" He is recommending some soft-shell
crabs," said the clever man.

And so, in desultory observation of the
idiosyncrasies of the new society in which
they found themselves, the young English-
men proceeded to dine — going in largely,
as the phrase is, for cooling draughts and
dishes, of which their attendant offered
them a very long list. After dinner they
went out and slowly walked about the
neighboring streets. The early dusk of
waning summer was coming on, but the
heat was still very great. The pavements
were hot even to the stout boot soles of the
British travellers, and the trees along the
curb-stone emitted strange exotic odors.
The young men wandered through the ad-
joining square — that queer place without
palings, and with marble walks arranged
in black and white lozenges. There were
a great many benches, crowded with shab-
by-looking people, and the travellers re-
marked, very justly, that it was not much
like Belgrave Square. On one side was
an enormous hotel, lifting up into the
hot darkness an immense array of open,

143

brightly lighted windows. At the base
of this populous structure was an eternal
jangle of horse-cars, and all round it, in
the upper dusk, was a sinister hum of
mosquitoes. The ground-floor of the hotel
seemed to be a huge transparent cage,
flinging a wide glare of gaslight into the
street, of which it formed a sort of public
adjunct, absorbing and emitting the pass-
ers-by promiscuously. The young Eng-
lishmen went in with every one else,
from curiosity, and saw a couple of hun-
dred men sitting on divans along a great
marble -paved corridor, with their legs
stretched out, together with several dozen
more standing in a queue, as at the ticket-
office of a railway station, before a brill-
iantly illuminated counter of vast extent.
These latter persons, who carried port-
manteaus in their hand, had a dejected,
exhausted look ; their garments were not
very fresh, and they seemed to be ren-
dering some mysterious tribute to a mag-
nificent young man with a waxed mus-
tache, and a shirt-front adorned with
diamond buttons, who every now and then
dropped an absent glance over their mul-
titudinous patience. They were American
citizens doing homage to a hotel clerk.

144

" I'm glad lie didn't tell us to go there/5
said one of our Englishmen, alluding to
their friend on the steamer, who had told
them so many things. They walked up
Fifth Avenue, where, for instance, he had
told them that all the first families lived.
But the first families were out of town,
and our young travellers had only the
satisfaction of seeing some of the second
— or, perhaps, even the third — taking the
evening air upon balconies and high
flights of door-steps, in the streets which
radiate from the more ornamental thor-
oughfare. They went a little way down
one of these side streets, and they saw
young ladies in white dresses — charm-
ing-looking persons — seated in graceful
attitudes on the chocolate-colored steps.
In one or two places these young ladies
were conversing across the street with
other young ladies seated in similar post-
ures and costumes in front of the opposite
houses, and in the warm night air their
colloquial tones sounded strange in the ears
of the young Englishmen.
One of our friends, never-
theless— the younger one
— intimated that he felt a
disposition to

interrupt a few of these soft familiar-
ities; but his companion observed, per-
tinently enough, that he had better be
careful. "We must not begin with mak-
ing mistakes," said his companion.

" But he told us, you know — he told
us," urged the young man, alluding again
to the friend on the steamer.

"Never mind what he told us!" an-
swered his comrade, who, if he had greater
talents, was also apparently more of a
moralist.

By bedtime — in their impatience to
taste of a terrestrial couch again, our sea-
farers went to bed early — it was still in-
sufferably hot, and the buzz of the mosqui-
toes at the open windows might have
passed for an audible crepitation of the
temperature. " We can't stand this, you
know," the young Englishmen said to
each other; and they tossed about all
night more boisterously than they had
tossed upon the Atlantic billows. On
the morrow their first thought was that
they would re-embark that day for Eng-
land ; and then it occurred to them that
they might find an asylum nearer at hand.
The cave of ^Eolus became their ideal of
comfort, and they wondered where the

146

Americans went when they wished to
cool off. They had not the least idea,
and they determined to apply for infor-
mation to Mr. J. L. Westgate. This was
the name inscribed in a bold hand on the
back of a letter carefully preserved in the
pocket-book of our junior traveller. Be-
neath the address, in the left-hand corner
of the envelope, were the words, " Intro-
ducing Lord Lambeth and Percy Beau-
mont, Esq." The letter had been given
to the two Englishmen by a good friend
of theirs in London, who had been in
America two years previously, and had
singled out Mr. J. L. Westgate from the
many friends he had left there as the
consignee, as it were, of his compatriots.-
"He is a capital fellow," the Englishman
in London had said, " and he has got an
awfully pretty wife. He's tremendously
hospitable — he will do everything in the
world for you ; and as he knows every
one over there, it is quite needless I should
give you any other introduction. He
will make you see every one ; trust to
him for putting you into circulation.
He has got a tremendously pretty wife."
It was natural that in the hour of trib-
ulation Lord Lambeth and Mr. Percy

Beaumont should have bethought them-
selves of a gentleman whose attractions
had been thus vividly depicted — all the
more so that he lived in Fifth Avenue,
and that Fifth Avenue, as they had ascer-
tained the night before, was contiguous to
their hotel. " Ten to one he'll be out of
town," said Percy Beaumont ; " but we can
at least find out where he has gone, and
we can immediately start in pursuit. He
can't possibly have gone to a hotter place,
you know."

" Oh, there's only one hotter place,"
said Lord Lambeth, " and I hope he hasn't
gone there."

They strolled along the shady side of
the street to the number indicated upon
the precious letter. The house presented
an imposing chocolate -colored expanse,
relieved by facings and window cornices
of florid sculpture, and by a couple of
dusty rose-trees which clambered over
the balconies and the portico. This last-
mentioned feature was approached by a
monumental flight of steps.

"Kather better than a London house,"
said Lord Lambeth, looking down from
this altitude, after they had rung the
bell.

148

k> It depends upon what London house
you mean," replied his companion. "You
have a tremendous chance to get wet be-
tween the house door and your carriage."

•• Well," said Lord Lambeth, glancing
at the burning heavens, "I 'guess' it
doesn't rain so much here!"

The door was opened by a long negro
in a white jacket, who grinned familiarly
when Lord Lambeth asked for Mr. West-
gate.

" He ain't at home, sah ;
he's down town at his o'fice."

"Oh, at his office?" said
the visitor. " And when will
he be at home ?"

" Well, sah, when he goes
out dis way in de mo'ning, he
ain't liable to come home all
day."

This wras discouraging; but the ad-'
dress of Mr. Westgate's office was freely
imparted by the intelligent black, and
was taken down by Percy Beaumont in
his pocket-book. The two gentlemen
then returned, languidly, to their hotel,
and sent for a hackney-coach, and in this
commodious vehicle they rolled comfort-
ably down - town. They measured the

whole length of Broadway again, and
found it a path of fire ; and then, deflect-
ing to the left, they were deposited by
their conductor before a fresh, light, or-
namental structure, ten stories high, in a
street crowded with keen -faced, light-
limbed young men, who were running
about very quickly, and stopping each
other eagerly at corners and in doorways.
Passing into this brilliant building, they
were introduced by one of the keen-faced
young men — he was a charming fellow,
in wonderful cream-colored garments and
a hat with a blue ribbon, who had evi-
dently perceived them to be aliens and
helpless — to a very snug hydraulic eleva-
tor, in which they took their place with
many other persons, and which, shooting
upward in its vertical socket, presently
projected them into the seventh horizon-
tal compartment of the edifice. Here,
after brief delay, they found themselves
face to face with the friend of their
friend in London. His office was corn-
posed of several different rooms, and they
waited very silently in one of them after
they had sent in their letter and their
cards. The letter was not one which it
would take Mr. "Westgate very long to

150

read, but he came out to speak to them
more instantly than they could have ex-
pected ; he had evidently jumped up from
his work. He was a tall, lean personage,
and was dressed all in fresh white linen ;
he had a thin, sharp, familiar face, with an
expression that was at one and the same
time sociable and business-like, a quick, in-
telligent eye, and a large brown mustache,
which concealed his mouth and made his
chin beneath it look small. Lord Lambeth
thought he looked tremendously clever.

"How do you do, Lord Lambeth — how
do you do, sir?" he said, holding the
open letter in his hand. " I'm very glad
to see you ; I hope you're very well.
You had better come in here; I think
it's cooler," and he led the way into an-
other room, where there were law-books
and papers, and windows wide open be-
neath striped awning. Just opposite one
of the windows, on a line with his eyes,
Lord Lambeth observed the weather-vane
of a church steeple. The uproar of the
street sounded infinitely far below, and
Lord Lambeth felt very high in the air.
"I say it's cooler," pursued their host,
"but everything is relative. How do
you stand the heat?"

151

"I can't say we like it," said Lord
Lambeth ; " but Beaumont likes it bet-
ter than I."

" Well, it won't last," Mr. Westgate
very cheerfully declared ; " nothing un-
pleasant lasts over here. It was very hot
when Captain Littledale was here; he
did nothing but drink sherry-cobblers.
He expresses some doubt in his letter
whether I will remember him — as if I
didn't remember making six sherry-cob-
blers for him one day in about twenty
minutes. I hope you left him well, two
years having elasped since then."

"Oh yes, he's all right," said Lord
Lambeth.

"I am always very glad to see your
countrymen," Mr. Westgate pursued.
"I thought it would be time some of
you should be coming along. A friend
of mine was sayingvto me only a day or
two ago, ' It's time for the watermelons
and the Englishmen.'"

"The Englishmen and the water-
melons just now are about the same
thing," Percy Beaumont said, wiping

his dripping
forehead.
"Ah, well,

we'll put you on ice, as we do the mel-
ons. You must go down to Newport."

" We'll go anywhere," said Lord Lam-
beth.

" Yes, you want to go to Newport ;
that's what you want to do," Mr. West-
gate affirmed. " But let's see — when did
you get here ?"

"Only yesterday," said Percy Beau-
mont.

" Ah, yes, by the Ifaissia. Where are
you staying?"

" At the Hanover, I think they call it."

"Pretty comfortable?" inquired Mr.
Westgate.

" It seems a capital place, but I can't
say we like the gnats," said Lord Lam-
beth.

Mr. Westgate stared and laughed. "Oh
no, of course you don't like the gnats.
We shall expect you to like a good many
things over here, but we sha'n't insist
upon your liking the gnats ; though cer-
tainly you'll admit that, as gnats, they
are fine, eh ? But you oughtn't to re-
main in the city."

" So we think," said Lord Lambeth.
" If you would kindly suggest some-
thing—"

153

" Suggest something, my dear sir ?"
and Mr. Westgate looked at him, narrow-
ing his eyelids. " Open your mouth and
shut your eyes ! Leave it to me, and I'll
put you through. It's a matter of na-
tional pride with me that all Englishmen
should have a good time ; and as I have
had considerable practice, I have learned
to minister to their wants. I find they
generally want the right thing. So just
please to consider yourselves my proper-
ty ; and if any one should try to appropri-
ate you, please to say, 'Hands off ; too late
for the market.' But let's see," continued
, the American, in his slow, humor-
ous voice, with a distinctness of ut-
terance which appeared to his visit-
ors to be a part of a humor-
ous intention — a strangely
;! leisurely speculative voice
for a man evidently so busy
and, as they felt, so professional—
" let's see ; are you going to make
something of a stay, Lord Lam-
beth?"

" Oh dear no," said the young

Englishman ; " my cousin was coming
over on some business, so I just came
across, at an hour's notice, for the lark."

"Is it your first visit to the United
States?" "

"Oh dear yes."

" I was obliged to come on some busi-
ness," said Percy Beaumont, " and I
brought Lambeth along."

" And you have been here before, sir ?"

" Never — never."

4.'I thought, from your referring to
business — " said Mr. Westgate.

" Oh, you see I'm by
way of being a barris-
ter," Percy Beaumont
answered. "I know
some people that think
of bringing a suit against
one of your railways,
and they asked me to come over
and take measures accordingly."

Mr. Westgate gave one of his
slow, keen looks again. "What's
your railroad?" he asked.

" The Tennessee Central."

The American tilted back his
chair a little, and poised it an in-
stant. " Well, I'm sorry you want

155

to attack one of our institutions," lie said,
smiling. " But I guess you had better en-
joy yourself first!"

"I'm certainly rather afraid I can't
work in this weather," the young barris-
ter confessed.

" Leave that to the natives," said Mr.
Westgate. "Leave the Tennessee Cen-
tral to me, Mr. Beaumont. Some day
we'll talk it over, and I guess I can make
it square. But I didn't know you Eng-
lishmen ever did any work, in the upper
classes."

" Oh, we do a lot of work ; don't we,
Lambeth ?" asked Percy Beaumont.

" I must certainly be at home by the
19th of September," said the younger
Englishman, irrelevantly but gently.

" For the shooting, eh ? , or is it the
hunting, or the fishing?" inquired his
entertainer.

"Oh, I must be in Scotland,"
said Lord Lambeth, blushing a
little.

" Well, then," rejoined Mr. West-
gate, " you had better amuse your-
self first, also. You must go down
and see Mrs. Westgate."

" We should be so happy, if you

would kindly tell us the train," said Percy
Beaumont.

" It isn't a train — it's a boat."

" Oh, I see. And what is the name of
— a — the — a — town ?"

" It isn't a town," said Mr. Westgate,
laughing. "It's a — well, what shall I call
it ? It's a watering-place. In short, it's
Newport. You'll see what it is. It's
cool ; that's the principal thing. You
will greatly oblige me by going down
there and putting yourself into the hands
of Mrs. Westgate. It isn't perhaps for
me to say it, but you couldn't be in bet-
ter hands. Also in those of her sister,
who is staying with her. She is very
fond of Englishmen. She thinks there
is nothing like them."

"Mrs. Westgate or — a — her sister?"
asked Percy Beaumont, modestly, yet in
the tone of an inquiring traveller.

" Oh, I mean my wife," said Mr. West-
gate. "I don't suppose my sister-in-law
knows much about them. She has always
led a very quiet life ; she has lived in
Boston."

Percy Beaumont listened with interest.
"That, I believe," he said, "is the most
— a — intellectual town?"

157

"I believe it is very intellectual. I
don't go there much," responded his host.

"I say, we ought to go there," said
Lord Lambeth to his companion.

"Oh, Lord Lambeth, wait till the
great heat is over," Mr. Westgate inter-
posed. "Boston in this weather would
be very trying; it's not the temperature
for intellectual exertion. At Boston, you
know, you have to pass an examination
at the city limits ; and when you come
away they give you a kind of degree."

Lord Lambeth stared, blushing a little ;
and Percy Beaumont stared a little also
— but only with his fine natural complex-
ion— glancing aside after a moment to
see that his companion was not looking
too credulous, for he had heard a great
deal of American humor. " I dare say it
is very jolly," said the younger gentle-
man.

" I dare say it is," said Mr. Westgate.
" Only I must impress upon you that at
present — to-morrow morning, at an early
hour — you will be expected at Newport.
We have a house there ; half the people
of New York go there for the summer. I
am not sure that at this very moment my
wife can take you in ; she has got a lot

158

of people staying with her ; I don't know
who they all are ; only she may have no
room. But you can begin with the hotel,
and meanwhile you can live at my house.
In that way — simply sleeping at the hotel
—you will tind it tolerable. For the rest,
you must make yourself at home at my
place. You mustn't be shy, you know ;
if you are only here for a month, that
will be a great waste of time. Mrs.
Westgate won't neglect you, and you
had better not try to resist her. I
know something about that. I ex-
pect you'll find some pretty girls on
the premises. I shall write to my
wife by this afternoon's mail, and
to-morrow morning she and Miss
Alden will look out for you. Just
walk right in and make yourself
comfortable. Your steamer leaves
from this part of the city, and I
will immediately send out and get
you a cabin. Then, at half-past
four o'clock, just call for me
here, and I will go with you and
put you on board. It's a big
boat ; you might get lost. A j
few days hence, at the end of
the week, I will come down

to Newport, and see how yon are getting
on."

The two young Englishmen inaugu-
rated the policy of not resisting Mrs.
Westgate by submitting, with great do-
cility and thankfulness, to her husband.
He was evidently a very good fellow,
and he made an impression upon his vis-
itors; his hospitality seemed to recom-
mend itself consciously — with a friendly
wink, as it were — as if it hinted, judi-
ciously, that you could not possibly make
a better bargain. Lord Lambeth and his
cousin left their entertainer to his labors
and returned to their hotel, where they
spent three or four hours in their respec-
tive shower-baths. Percy Beaumont had
suggested that they ought to see some-
thing of the town ; but " Oh, d — n the
town !" his noble kinsman had rejoined.
They returned to Mr. West-gate's office
in a carriage, with their luggage, very
punctually; but it must be reluctantly
recorded that, this time, he kept them
waiting so long that they felt themselves
missing the steamer, and were deterred
only by an amiable modesty from dis-
pensing with his attendance, and starting
on a hasty scramble to the wharf. But

when at last he appeared, and the car-
riage plunged into the purlieus of Broad-
way, they jolted and jostled to such good
purpose that they reached the huge white
vessel while the bell for departure was
still ringing, and the absorption of pas-
sengers still active. It was indeed, as
Mr. AVestgate had said, a big boat, and
his leadership in the innumerable and
interminable corridors and cabins, with
which he seemed perfectly acquainted,
and of which any one and every one ap-
peared to have the entree, was very grate-
ful to the slightly bewildered voyagers.
He showed them their state-room — a spa-
cious apartment, embellished with gas-
lamps, mirrors en pied, and sculptured
furniture — and then, long after they had
been intimately convinced that the steam-
er was in motion and launched upon the
unknown stream that they were about to
navigate, he bade them a sociable fare-
well.

"Well, good-bye, Lord Lambeth," he
said ; " good-bye, Mr. Percy Beaumont. I
hope you'll have a good time. Just let
them do what they want with you. I'll
come down by -and -by and look after
you."

161

FALL

STEAMBO/
NEWPOI

LEAVES I»»R

The young Englishmen
emerged from their cabin
and amused themselves with wan-
dering about the immense labyrin-
thine steamer, which struck them
as an extraordinary mixture of a
ship and a hotel. It was dense-
ly crowded with passengers, the
larger number of whom appeared
to be ladies and very young chil-
dren ; and in the big saloons, orna-
mented in white and gold, which
followed each other in surprising
succession, beneath the swinging
gaslight, and among the small side
passages where the negro domes-
tics of both sexes assembled with
an air of philosophic leisure, ev-
ery one was moving to and fro and
exchanging loud and familiar ob-
servations. Eventually, at the in-
stance of a discriminating black,
our young men went and had some
"supper" in a wonderful place ar-
ranged like a theatre, where, in a
gilded gallery, upon which little

boxes appeared to open, a large orches-
tra was playing operatic selections, and,
below, people were handing about bills
of fare, as if they had been programmes.
All this was sufficiently curious ; but the
agreeable tiling, later, was to sit out on
one of the great white decks of the
steamer, in the warm, breezy darkness,
and, in the vague starlight, to make out
the line of low, mysterious coast. The
young Englishmen tried American ci-
gars— those of Mr. Westgate — and talked
together as they usually talked, with many
odd silences, lapses of logic, and incon-
gruities of transition, like people who
have grown old together, and learned to
supply each other's missing phrases ; or,
more especially, like people thoroughly
conscious of a common point of view, so
that a style of conversation superficially
lacking in finish might suffice for refer-
ence to a fund of associations in the light
of which everything was all right.

" We really seem to be going out to
sea," Percy Beaumont observed. "Upon
my word, we are going back to England.
He has shipped us off again. I call that
'real mean."1

" I suppose it's all right,'' said Lord

163

Lambeth. "I want to see
those pretty girls at New-
port You know he told us the
place was an island ; and aren't all
islands in the sea ?"

"Well," resumed the elder trav-
eller after a while, " if his
house is as good as his
cigars, we shall do very
well indeed."

" He seems a very good fel-
low," said Lord Lambeth, as
x if this idea just occurred to

him.

" I say, we had better remain at the
inn," rejoined his companion, present-
ly. "I don't think I like the way he
spoke of his house, I don't like stop-
ping in the house with such a tremen-
dous lot of women."

"Oh, I don't mind," said Lord Lam-
beth. And then they smoked a while in
silence. " Fancy his thinking we do no
work in England !" the young man re-
sumed.

" I dare say he didn't really think so3"
said Percy Beaumont.

" "Well, I guess they don't know much
about England over here !" declared Lord
Lambeth, humorously. And then there
was another long pause. " He was dev-
ilish civil," observed the young noble-
man.

"Nothing, certainly, could have been
more civil," rejoined his companion.

"Littledale said his wife was great
fun," said Lord Lambeth.

"Whose wife— Littledale's ?"

" This American's — Mrs. Westgate.
What's his name? J. L."

Beaumont was silent a moment.
" What was fun to Littledale," he said
at last, rather sententiously, "may
be death to us."

" What do you mean by that ?"
asked his kinsman. " I am as good
a man as Littledale."

" My dear boy, I hope you won't
begin to flirt," said Percy Beaumont.

" I don't care. I dare say I sha'n't
begin."

" With a married woman, if she's
bent upon it, it's all very well,"

Beaumont expounded. " But our

friend mentioned a young lady

— a sister, a sister-in-law. For

God's •sake, don't get entangled with
her !"

" How do you mean entangled ?"

" Depend upon it she will try to hook
you."

" Oh, bother !" said Lord Lambeth.

" American girls are very clever," urged
his companion.

" So much the better," the young man
declared.

" I fancy they are always up to some
game of that sort," Beaumont continued.

" They can't be worse than they are in
England," said Lord Lambeth, judicially.

" Ah, but in England," replied Beau-
mont, "you have got your natural pro-
tectors. You have got your mother and
sisters."

" My mother and sisters — " began the
young nobleman, with a certain energy.
But he stopped in time, puffing at his
cigar.

"Your mother spoke to me about it,
with tears in her eyes," said Percy Beau-
mont. " She said she felt very nervous.
I promised to keep you out of mischief."

" You had better take care of yourself,"
said the object of maternal and ducal so-
licitude.

166

" All," rejoined the young barrister, " I
haven't the expectation of a hundred
thousand a year, not to mention other
attractions."

"Well," said Lord Lambeth, "don't
cry out before you're hurt !"

It was certainly very much cooler at

Newport, where our travellers found
themselves assigned to a couple of di-
minutive bedrooms in a far-away angle
of an immense hotel. They had gone
ashore in the early summer twilight, and
had very promptly put themselves to
bed ; thanks to which circumstance, and
to their having, during the previous hours
in their commodious cabin slept the sleep
of youth and health, they began to feel,
towards eleven o'clock, very alert and in-

167

quisitive. They looked out of their win-
dows across a row of small green fields,
bordered with low stone -walls of rude
construction, and saw a deep blue ocean
lying beneath a deep blue sky, and fleck-
ed now and then with scintillating patch-
es of foam. A strong, fresh breeze came
in through the curtainless casements, and
prompted our young men to observe gen-
erally that it didn't seem half a bad cli-
mate. They made other observations
after they had emerged from their rooms
in pursuit of breakfast — a meal of which
they partook in a huge bare hall, where
a hundred negroes in white jackets were
shuffling about upon an uncarpeted floor ;
where the flies were superabundant, and
the tables and dishes covered over with a
strange, voluminous integument of coarse
blue gauze ; and where several little boys
and girls, who had risen late, were seated
in fastidious solitude at the morning re-
past. These young persons had not the
morning paper before them, but they
were engaged in languid perusal of
the bill of fare.

This latter document was a great
puzzle to our friends, who, on re-
flecting that its bewildering catego-

168

ries had relation to breakfast alone, had
an uneasy prevision of an encyclopaedic
dinner list. They found a great deal of
entertainment at the hotel, an enormous
wooden structure, for the erection of
which it seemed to them that the virgin
forests of the West must have been terri-
bly deflowered. It was perforated from
end to end with immense bare corridors,
through which a strong draught was
blowing — bearing along wonderful fig-
ures of ladies in white morning -dresses
and clouds of Valenciennes lace, who
seemed to float down the long vistas with
expanded furbelows like angels spread-
ing their wings. In front was a gigan-
tic veranda, upon which an army might
have encamped — a vast wooden terrace,
with a roof as lofty as the nave of a ca-
thedral. Here our young Englishmen
enjoyed, as they supposed, a glimpse of
American society, which was distributed
over the measureless expanse in a varie-
ty of sedentary attitudes, and appeared
to consist largely of pretty young girls,
dressed as if for a fete champetre,
swaying to and fro in rocking-chairs,
fanning themselves with large straw
fans, and enjoying an enviable ex- /

eruption from social cares. Lord Lam-
beth had a theory, which it might be in-
teresting to trace to its origin, that it
would be not only agreeable, but easily
possible, to enter into relations with one
of these young ladies; and his companion
(as he had done a couple of days before)
found occasion to check the young no-
bleman's colloquial impulses.

" You had better take care," said Percy
Beaumont, " or you will have an offended
father or brother pulling out a bowie-
knife."

"I assure you it is all right," Lord
Lambeth replied. " You know the Amer-
icans come to these big hotels to make
acquaintances."

" I know nothing about it, and neither
do you," said his kinsman, who, like a
clever man, had begun to perceive that
the observation of American society de-
manded a readjustment of one's stand-
ard.

" Hang it, then, let's find out !" cried
Lord Lambeth, with some impatience.
"You know I don't want to miss any-
thing."

"We will find out," said Percy Beau-
mont, very reasonably. "We will go

170

and see Mrs. Westgate, and make all the
proper inquiries."

And so the two inquiring Englishmen,
who had this lady's address inscribed in
her husband's hand upon a card, descend-
ed from the veranda of the big hotel and
took their way, according to direction,
along a large, straight road, past a series
of fresh - looking villas embosomed in
shrubs and flowers, and enclosed in an
ingenious variety of wooden palings.
The morning was brilliant and cool, the
villas were smart and snug, and the walk
of the young travellers was very en-
tertaining. Everything looked as if it
had received a coat of fresh paint the
day before — the red roofs, the green
shutters, the clean, bright browns and
buffs of the house fronts. The flower
beds on the little lawns seemed to spar-
kle in the radiant air, and the gravel
in the short carriage sweeps to flash and
twinkle. Along the road came a hun-
dred little basket-phaetons, in which, al-
most always, a couple of ladies were sit-
ting— ladies in white dresses and long
white gloves, holding the reins and look-
ing at the two Englishmen — whose na-
tionality was not elusive — through thick

173

blue veils tied tightly about their faces,
as if to guard their complexions. At
last the young men came within sight of
the sea again, and then, having interro-
gated a gardener over the paling of a
villa, they turned into an open gate.
Here they found themselves face to face
with the ocean and with a very pictu-
resque structure, resembling a magnified
chalet, which was perched upon a green
embankment just above it. The house
had a veranda of extraordinary width all
around it, and a great many doors and
windows standing open to the veranda.
These various apertures had, in common,
such an accessible, hospitable air, such a
breezy flutter within of light curtains,
such expansive thresholds and reassuring
interiors, that our friends hardly knew
which was the regular entrance, and, after
hesitating a moment, presented them-
selves at one of the windows. The room
within was dark, but in a moment a grace-
ful figure vaguely shaped itself in the
rich-looking gloom, and a lady came to
meet them. Then they saw that she had
been seated at a table writing, and that
she had heard them and had got up. She
stepped out into the light ; she wore a

174

frank, charming smile, with which she
held out her hand to Percy Beaumont.

" Oh, you must be Lord Lambeth arid
Mr. Beaumont," she said. " I have heard
from my husband that you would come.
I am extremely glad to see you." And
she shook hands with each of her visitors.
Iler visitors were a little shy, but they
had very good manners ; they responded
with smiles and exclamations, and they
apologized for not knowing the front
door. The lady rejoined, with vivacity,
that when she wanted to see people very
much she did not insist upon those dis-
tinctions, and that Mr. Westgate had
written to her of his English friends in
terms that made her really anxious. " He
said you were so terribly prostrated," said
Mrs. Westgate.

"Oh, you mean by the heat?"
replied Percy Beaumont. " We
were rather knocked up, but we
feel wonderfully better. We
had such a jolly— a — voyage
down here. It's so very good
of you to mind."

" Yes, it's so very kind
of yon," murmured
Lord Lambeth.

Mrs. Westgate stood smiling ; she was
extremely pretty. " Well, I did mind,"
she said ; " and I thought of sending for
you this morning to the Ocean House.
I am very glad you are better, and I am
charmed you have arrived. You must
come round to the other side of the
piazza." And she led the way, with a
light, smooth step, looking back at the
young men and smiling.

The other side of the piazza was, as
Lord Lambeth presently remarked, a very
jolly place. It was of the most liberal pro-
portions, and with its awnings, its fanci-
ful chairs, its cushions and rugs, its view
of the ocean, close at hand, tumbling
along the base of the low cliffs whose
level tops intervened in lawn-like smooth-
ness, it formed a charming complement
to the drawing-room. As such it was in
course of use at the present moment ; it
was occupied by a social circle. There
were several ladies and two or three gen-
tlemen, to whom Mrs. Westgate proceeded
to introduce the distinguished strangers.
She mentioned a great many names very
freely and distinctly ; the young English-
men, shuffling about and bowing, were
rather bewildered. But at last they were

176

provided with chairs — low, wicker chairs,
gilded, and tied with a great many rib-
bons— and one of the ladies (a very young
person, with a little snub-nose and several
dimples) offered Percy Beaumont a fan.
The fan was also adorned with pink love-
knots ; but Percy Beaumont declined it,
although he was very hot. Presently,
however, it became cooler; the breeze
from the sea was delicious, the view was
charming, and the people sitting there
looked exceedingly fresh and comfortable.
Several of the ladies seemed to be young
girls, and the gentlemen were slim, fair
youths, such as our friends had seen the
day before in New York. The ladies
were working upon bands of tapestry,
and one of the young men had an open
book in his lap. Beaumont afterwards
learned from one of the ladies that this
young man had been reading aloud ; that
he was from Boston, and was very fond
of reading aloud. Beaumont said it was
a great pity that they had interrupted
him ; he should like so much (from all he
had heard) to hear a Bostonian read.
Couldn't the young man be induced to
go on ?

" Oh no," said his informant, very

177

freely; "he wouldn't be able to get the
young ladies to attend to him now."

There was something very friendly,
Beaumont perceived, in the attitude of
the company ; they looked at the young
Englishmen with an air of animated sym-
pathy and interest ; they smiled, brightly
and unanimously, at everything either of
the visitors said. Lord Lambeth and his
companion felt that they were being made
very welcome. Mrs. Westgate seated her-
self between them, and, talking a great
deal to each, they had occasion to observe
that she was as pretty as their friend
Littledale had promised. She was thirty
, years old, with the eyes and the smile of
a girl of seventeen, and she was extreme-
, ly light and graceful — elegant, exquisite.
Mrs. Westgate was extremely spontane-
1 ous. She was very frank and demonstra-
tive, and appeared always — while she
looked at you delightedly with her beau-
tiful young eyes — to be making sudden
confessions and concessions after momen-
tary hesitations.

"We shall expect to see a great deal
of you," she said to Lord Lambeth, with
a kind of joyous earnestness. "We are

IP \">

very fond of Englishmen here — that is,
there are a great many we have been fond
of. After a day or two you must come
and stay with us ; we hope you will stay
a long time. Newport's a very nice place
when you come really to know it — when
you know plenty of people. Of course
you and Mr. Beaumont will have no diffi-
culty about that. Englishmen are very
well received here ; there are almost al-
ways two or three of them about. I think
they always like it, and I must say I
should think they would. They receive
ever so much attention. I must say I
think they sometimes get spoiled ; but I
am sure you and Mr. Beaumont are proof
against that.

" My husband tells me you are a friend
of Captain Littledale. He was such a
charming man : he made himself most
agreeable here, and I am sure I wonder
he didn't stay. It couldn't have been
pleasanter for him in his own country,
though, I suppose, it is very pleasant in
England — for English people. I don't
know myself; I have been there very
little. I have been a great deal abroad,
but I am always on the Continent. I
must say I am extremely fond of Paris ;

179

you know we Americans always are ; we
go there when we die. Did you ever
hear that before? That was said by a
great wit — I mean the good Americans;
but we are all good ; you'll see that for
yourself.

"All I know of England is London,
and all I know of London is that place
on that little corner, you know, where
you buy jackets — jackets with that coarse
braid and those big buttons. They make
very good jackets in London ; I will do
you the justice to say that. And some
people like the hats ; but about the hats
I was always a heretic ; I always got my
hats in Paris. You can't wear an English
hat— at least, I never could — unless you
dress your hair a VAnglcbisej and I must
say that is a talent I never possessed. In
Paris they will make things to suit your
peculiarities ; but in England I think you
like much more to have — how shall I say
it? — one thing for everybody. I mean
as regards dress. I don't know about
other things ; but I have always supposed
that in other things everything was dif-
ferent. I mean according to the people
— according to the classes, and all that.
I am afraid you will think that I don't

180

take a very favorable view; but you know
you can't take a very favorable view in
Dover Street in the month of November.
That has always been my fate.

" Do you know Jones's Hotel, in Dover
Street ? That's all I know of England.
Of course every one admits that the Eng-
lish hotels are your weak point. There
was always the most frightful fog; I
couldn't see to try my things on. When
I got over to America — into the light — I
usually found they were twice too big.
The next time I mean to go in the season;
I think I shall go next year. I want very
much to take my sister; she has never
been to England. I don't know whether
you know what I mean by saying that
the Englishmen who come here some-
times get spoiled. I mean that they take
things as a matter of course — things that
are done for them. Now, naturally, they
are only a matter of course when the
Englishmen are very nice. But, of course,
they are almost always very nice. Of
course this isn't nearly such an interest-
ing country as England ; there are not
nearly so many things to see, and we
haven't your country life. I have never
seen anything of your country life ; when

181

I am in Europe I am always on the Conti-
nent. But I have heard a great deal
about it ; I know that when you are
among yourselves in the country you have
the most beautiful time. Of course we
have nothing of that sort ; we have noth-
ing on that scale.

" I don't apologize, Lord Lambeth ;
some Americans are always apologizing ;
you must have noticed that. We have
the reputation of always boasting and
bragging and waving the American flag ;
but I must say that what strikes me is
that we are perpetually making excuses
and trying to smooth tilings over. The
American flag has quite gone out of fash-
ion ; it's very carefully folded up like an
old table-cloth. Why should we apol-
ogize? The English never apologize —
do they? No ; I must say I never apol-
ogize. You must take us as we come —
with all our imperfections on our heads.
Of course we haven't your country life,
and your old ruins, and your great estates,
and your leisure class, and all that. But
if we haven't, I should think you might
find it a pleasant change — I think any
country is pleasant where they have pleas-
ant manners.

u Captain Littledale told me he had
never seen such pleasant manners as at
Newport, and he had been a great deal
in European society. Hadn't he been in
the diplomatic service? He told me the
dream of his life was to get appointed to
a diplomatic post at Washington. But
he doesn't seem to have succeeded. I
suppose that in England promotion — and
all that sort of thing — is fearfully slow.
With us, you know, it's a great deal too
fast. You see, I admit our drawbacks.
But I must confess I think Newport is
an ideal place. I don't know anything
like it anywhere. Captain Littledale
told me he didn't know anything like it
anywhere. It's entirely different from
most watering-places ; it's a most charm-
ing life. I must say I think that when
one goes to a foreign country one ought
to enjoy the differences. Of course there
are differences, otherwise what did one
come abroad for? Look for your pleas-
ure in the differences, Lord Lambeth ;
that's the way to do it ; and then I am
sure you will find American society — at
least, Newport society — most charming
and most interesting. I wish very much
my husband were here ; but he's dread-

183

fully confined to New York. I suppose
you think that is very strange — for a
gentleman. But you see we haven't any
leisure class."

Mrs. Westgate's discourse, delivered in
a soft, sweet voice, flowed on like a min-
iature torrent, and was interrupted by a
hundred little smiles, glances, and gest-
ures, which might have figured the ir-
regularities and obstructions of such a
stream. Lord Lambeth listened to her
with, it must be confessed, a rather in-
effectual attention, although he indulged
in a good many little murmurs and ejac-
ulations of assent and deprecation. He
had no great faculty for apprehending
generalizations. There were some three
or four indeed which, in the play of his
own intelligence, he had originated, and
which had seemed convenient at the mo-
ment ; but at the present time he could
hardly have been said to follow Mrs.
Westgate as she darted gracefully about
in the sea of speculation. Fortunately,
she asked for no special rejoinder, for she
looked about at the rest of the company
as well, and smiled at Percy Beaumont,
on the other side of her, as if he, too, must
understand her and agree with her. He

184

was rather more successful than his com-
panion; for besides being, as we know,
cleverer, his attention was not vaguely
distracted by close vicinity to a remark-
ably interesting young girl with dark
hair and blue eyes. This was the case
with Lord Lambeth, to whom it occurred
after a while that the young girl with
blue eyes and dark hair was the pretty
sister of whom Mrs. Westgate had spoken.
She presently turned to him with a re-
mark which established her identity.

" It's a great pity you
couldn't have brought
my brother-in-law

with you. It's a great shame he should
be in New York in these days."

" Oh yes ; it's so very hot," said Lord
Lambeth.

" It must be dreadful," said the young
girl.

" I dare say he is very busy," Lord
Lambeth observed.

" The gentlemen in America work too
much," the young girl went on.

" Oh, do they ? I dare say they like
it," said her interlocutor.

" I don't like it. One never sees them."

" Don't you, really ?" asked Lord Lam-
beth. " I shouldn't have fancied that."

" Have you come to study American
manners ?" asked the young girl.

" Oh, I don't know. I just came over
for a lark. I haven't got long." Here
there was a pause, and Lord Lambeth be-
gan again. "But Mr. Westgate will come
down here, will he not ?"

"I certainly hope he will. He must
help to entertain you and Mr. Beaumont."

Lord Lambeth looked at her a little
with his handsome brown eyes. "Do
you suppose he would have come down
with us if we had urged him ?"

Mr. Westgate's sister-in-law was silent

186

a moment, and then, " I dare say he
would," she answered.

".Really !" said the young Englishman.
"He was immensely civil to Beaumont
and me," he added.

" He is a dear, good fellow," the young
lady rejoined, "and he is a perfect hus-
band. But all Americans are that," she
continued, smiling.

" Really !" Lord Lambeth exclaimed
again, and wondered whether all Amer-
ican ladies had such a passion for gener-
alizing as these two.

He sat there a good while : there was
a great deal of talk ; it was all very
friendly and lively and jolly. Every one
present, sooner or later, said something
to him, and seemed to make a particular
point of addressing him by name. Two
or three other persons came in, and there
Avas a shifting of seats and changing of
places ; the gentlemen all entered into
intimate conversation with the two Eng-
lishmen, made them urgent offers of hos-
pitality, and hoped they might frequently
be of service to them. They were afraid
Lord Lambeth and Mr. Beaumont were
not very comfortable at their hotel ; that
it was not, as one of them said, " so pri-

187

vate as those dear little English inns of
yours." This last gentleman went on to
say that unfortunately, as yet, perhaps,
privacy was not quite so easily obtained
in America as might be desired ; still, he
continued, you could generally get it by
paying for it ; in fact, you could get
everything in America nowadays by
paying for it. American life was cer-
tainly growing a great deal more pri-
vate ; it was growing very much like
England. Everything at Newport, for
instance, was thoroughly private ; Lord
Lambeth would probably be struck with
that. It was also represented to the
strangers that it mattered very little
whether their hotel was agreeable, as
every one would want them to make
visits ; they would stay with other peo-
ple, and, in any case, they would be a
great deal at Mrs. Westgate's. They
would find that very charming; it was
the pleasantest house in Newport. It
was a pity Mr. Westgate was always
away ; he was a man of the highest
ability — very acute, very acute. He
worked like a horse, and he left his wife
—well, to do about as she liked. He
liked her to enjoy herself, and she seemed

to kno\v
She was ex-
tremely brill-
iant, and a
splendid talk-
er. Some peo-
ple preferred

her sister ; but Miss Aid en was

very different ; she was in a dif-

ferent style altogether. Some people even
thought her prettier, and, certainly, she
was not so sharp. She was more in the
Boston style ; she had lived a great deal
in Boston, and she was very highly ed-
ucated. Boston girls, it was propounded,
were more like English young ladies.

Lord Lambeth had presently a chance
to test the truth of this proposition, for
on the company rising in compliance with
a suggestion from their hostess that they
should walk down to the rocks and look
at the sea, the young Englishman again
found himself, as they strolled across the
grass, in proximity to Mrs. Westgate's
sister. Though she was but a girl of
twenty, she appeared to feel the obliga-
tion to exert an active hospitality ; and

this was, perhaps, the more to be noticed
as she seemed by nature a reserved and
retiring person, and had little of her sis-
ter's fraternizing quality. She was, per-
haps, rather too thin, and she was a little
pale ; but as she moved slowly over the
grass, with her arms hanging at her sides,
looking gravely for a moment at the sea
and then brightly, for all her gravity, at
him, Lord Lambeth thought her at least
as pretty as Mrs. Westgate, and reflected
that if this was the Boston style the Bos-
ton style was very charming. He thought
she looked very clever ; he could imagine
that she was highly educated ; but at the
same time she seemed gentle and grace-
ful. For all her cleverness, however, he
felt that she had to think a little what to
say; she didn't say the first thing that
came into her head ; he had come from a
different part of the world and fram a
different society, and she was trying to
adapt her conversation. The others were
scattering themselves near the rocks;
Mrs. Westgate had charge of Percy Beau-
mont.

" Very jolly place, isn't it ?" said Lord
Lambeth. " It's a very jolly place to sit."

" Very charming," said the young girl.

190

" I often sit here ; there are all kinds of
cosey corners — as if they had been made
on purpose."

"Ah, I suppose you have had some
of them made," said the young man.

Miss Alden looked at him a moment.
" Oh no, we have had nothing made. It's
pure nature."

" I should think you would have a few
little benches — rustic seats, and that sort
of thing. It might be so jolly to sit here,
you know," Lord Lambeth went on.

"I am afraid we haven't so many of
those things as you," said the young girl,
thoughtfully.

" I dare say you go in for pure nature,
as you were saying. Nature over here
must be so grand, you know." And Lord
Lambeth looked about him.

The little coast -line hereabouts was
very pretty, but it was not at all grand,
and Miss Alden appeared to rise to a per-
ception of this fact. "I am afraid it
seems to you very rough," she said. " It's
not like the coast scenery in Kingsley's
novels."

" Ah, the novels always overdo it, you
know," Lord Lambeth rejoined. " You
must not go by the novels."

191

They were wandering about a little on
the rocks, and they stopped and looked
down into a narrow chasm where the ris-
ing tide made a curious bellowing sound.
It was loud enough to prevent their hear-
ing each other, and they stood there for
some moments in silence. The young
girl looked at her companion, observing
him attentively, but covertly, as women,
even when very young, know how to
do. Lord Lambeth repaid observation ;
tall, straight, and strong, he was hand-
some as certain young Englishmen, and
certain young Englishmen, almost alone,
are handsome, with a perfect finish of
feature and a look of intellectual repose
and gentle good -temper which seemed
somehow to be consequent upon his well-
cut nose and chin. And to speak of
Lord Lambeth's expression of intellectual

repose is not simply a civil way of say-
ing that he looked stupid. He was ev-
idently not a young man of an irritable
imagination ; he was not, as he would
himself have said, tremendously clever;
but though there was a kind of appealing
dniness in his eye, he looked thoroughly
reasonable and competent, and his appear-
ance proclaimed that to be a nobleman,
an athlete, and an excellent fellow was a
sufficiently brilliant combination of qual-
ities. The young girl beside him, it may
be attested without further delay, thought
him the handsomest young man she had
ever seen ; and Bessie Alden's imagina-
tion, unlike that of her companion, was
irritable. He, however, was also making
up his mind that she was uncommonly
pretty.

"I dare say it's very gay here — that
you have lots of balls and parties," he
said ; for, if he was not tremendously
clever, he rather prided himself on hav-
ing, with women, a sufficiency of con-
versation.

"Oh yes, there is a great deal going
on," Bessie Alden replied. " There are
not so many balls, but there are a good
many other things. You will see for

yourself ; we live rather in the midst of
it."

"It's very kind of you to say that.
But I thought you Americans were al-
ways dancing."

" I suppose we dance a good deal ; but
I have never seen much of it. We don't
do it much, at any rate, in summer. And
I am sure," said Bessie Alden, " that we
don't have so many balls as you have in
England."

" Really !" exclaimed Lord Lambeth.
" Ah, in England it all depends, you
know."

" You will not think much of our gay-
eties," said the young girl, looking at
him with a little mixture of interrogation
and decision which was peculiar to her.
The interrogation seemed earnest and the
decision seemed arch ; but the mixture, at
any rate, was charming. " Those things,
with us, are much less splendid than in
England."

" I fancy you don't mean that," said
Lord Lambeth, laughing.

" I assure you I mean everything I say,"
the young girl declared. " Certainly,
from what I have read about English
society, it is very different."

194

" All well, you know," said her com-
panion, " those things are often described
by fellows who know nothing about them.
You mustn't mind what you read."

" Oh, I shall mind what I read !" Bessie
Alden rejoined. " When I read Thackeray
and George Eliot, how can I help mind-
ing them ?"

"Ah, well, Thackeray and George
Eliot," said the young nobleman ; " I
haven't read much of them."

" Don't you suppose they know about
society ?" asked Bessie Alden.

" Oh, I dare say they know ; they were
so clever. But these fashionable novels,"
said Lord Lambeth, " they are awful rot,
you know."

His companion looked at him a mo-
ment with her dark blue eyes, and then
she looked down in the chasm where the
water was tumbling about. " Do you
mean Mrs. Gore, for instance ?" she said,
presently, raising her eyes.

"I am afraid I haven't read that, ei-
ther," was the young man's rejoinder,
laughing a little and blushing. "I am
afraid you'll think I am not very intel-
lectual."

" Reading Mrs. Gore is no proof of in-
195

tellect. But I like reading everything,
about English life — even poor books. Ij
am so curious about it."

"Aren't ladies always curious?" asked
the young man, jestingly.

But Bessie Alden appeared to desire to
answer his question seriously. " I don't
think so — I don't think we are enough so
— that we care about many things. So
it's all the more of a compliment," she
added, " that I should want to know so
much about England."

The logic here seemed a little close;
but Lord Lambeth, made conscious of a
compliment, found his natural modesty
just at hand. " I am sure you know a
great deal more than I do."

" I really think I know a great deal —
for a person who has never been there."

" Have you really never been there ?"
cried Lord Lambeth. " Fancy !"

"Never — except in imagination," said
the young girl.

"Fancy!" repeated her companion.
"But I dare say you'll go soon, won't
you?"

196

"It's the dream of my life!" said Bessie
Alden, smiling.

" But your sister seems to know a tre-
mendous lot about London," Lord Lam-
beth went on.

The young girl was silent a moment.
" My sister and I are two very different
persons," she presently said. " She has
been a great deal in Europe. She has
been in England several times. She has
known a great many English people."

"But you must have known some, too,"
said Lord Lambeth.

" I don't think that I have ever spoken
to one before. You are the first Eng-
lishman that — to my knowledge — I have
ever talked with."

Bessie Alden made this statement with
a certain gravity — almost, as it seemed to
Lord Lambeth, an impressi veil ess. At-
tempts at impressiveness always made
him feel awkward, and he now began to
laugh and swing his stick. "Ah, you
would have been sure to know !" he said.
And then he added, after an instant, "I'm
sorry I am not a better specimen."

The young girl looked away ; but she
smiled, laying aside her impressiveness.
"You must remember that you are only a

197'

beginning," she said. Then she retraced
her steps, leading the -way back to the
lawn, where they saw Mrs. Westgate come
towards them with Percy Beaumont still
at her side. " Perhaps I shall go to Eng-
land next year," Miss Alden continued ;
" I want to, immensely. My sister is
going to Europe, and she has asked me
to go with her. If we go, I shall make
her stay as long as possible in London."

"Ah, you must come in July," said
Lord Lambeth. " That's the time when
there is most going on."

" I don't think I can wait till July,"
the young girl rejoined. "By the first
of May I shall be very impatient." They
had gone farther, and Mrs. Westgate and
her companion were near them. "Kit-
ty," said Miss Alden, " I have given out
that we are going to London next May.
So please to conduct yourself accord-
ingly."

Percy Beaumont wore a somewhat ani-
mated— even a slightly irritated — air.
He was by no means so handsome a man
as his cousin, although in his cousin's ab-
sence he might have passed for a striking
specimen of the tall, muscular, fair-beard-
ed, clear- eyed Englishman. Just now

Beaumont's clear eyes, which were small
and of a pale gray color, had a rather trou-
bled light, and, after glancing at Bessie
Alden while she spoke, he rested them
upon his kinsman. Mrs. Westgate mean-
while, with her superfluously pretty gaze,
looked at every one alike.

"You had better wait till the time
comes," she said to her sister. "Perhaps
next May you won't care so much about
London. Mr. Beaumont and I," she went
on, smiling at her companion, " have had
a tremendous discussion. We don't agree
about anything. It's perfectly delight-
ful."

" Oh, I say, Percy !" exclaimed Lord
Lambeth.

" I disagree," said Beaumout, stroking
down his back hair, "even to the point
of not thinking it delightful."

" Oh, I say !" cried Lord Lambeth again.

"I don't see anything delightful in
my disagreeing with Mrs. Westgate," said
Percy Beaumont.

"Well, I do!" Mrs. Westgate declared;
and she turned to her sister. " You know
you have to go to town. The phaeton is
there. You had better take Lord Lam-
beth."

199

At tins point Percy Beaumont certainly
looked straight at his kinsman ; he tried
to catch his eye. But Lord Lambeth
would not look at him; his own eyes
were better occupied. " I shall be very
happy," cried Bessie Alden. "I am only
going to some shops. But I will drive
you about and show you the place."

"An American woman who respects
herself," said Mrs. Westgate, turning to
Beaumont with her bright expos-
itory air, "must buy something
every day of her life. If she can-
not do it herself, she
must send
out some
member of
her family
for the pur-
pose. So
Bessie goes
forth to ful-
fil my mis-
sion."
The young
girl had

walked away, with Lord Lambeth by her
side, to whom she was talking still ; and
Percy Beaumont watched them as they
passed towards the house. " She fulfils
her own mission," he presently said ; "that
of being a very attractive young lady."

" I don't know that I should say very
attractive," Mrs. Westgate rejoined. " She
is not so much that as she is charming,
when you really know her. She is very
shy."

"Oh, indeed !" said Percy Beaumont.

"Extremely shy," Mrs. Westgate re-
peated. " But she is a dear, good girl ;
she is a charming species of a girl. She
is not in the least a flirt ; that isn't at all
her line ; she doesn't know the alphabet
of that sort of thing. She is very simple,
very serious. She has lived a great deal
in Boston, with another sister of mine —
the eldest of us — who married a Bos-
tonian. She is very cultivated — not at
all like me ; I am not in the least cul-
tivated. She has studied immensely and
read everything ; she is what they call in
Boston < thoughtful.' "

"A rum sort of girl for Lambeth to
get hold of !" his lordship's kinsman pri-
vately reflected.

201

" I really believe," Mrs. Westgate con-
tinued, " that the most charming girl in
the world is a Boston superstructure
upon a New Yorkfondsj or perhaps a
New York superstructure upon a Boston
fonds. At any rate, it's the mixture,"
said Mrs. Westgate, who continued to
give Percy Beaumont a great deal of in-
formation.

Lord Lambeth got into a little basket
phaeton with Bessie Alden, and she drove
him down the long avenue, whose extent
he had measured on foot a couple of hours
before, into the ancient town, as it was
called in that part of the world, of New-
port. The ancient town was a curious
affair — a collection of fresh-looking little
wooden houses, painted white, scattered
over a hill-side and clustered about a long,
straight street, paved with enormous cob-
ble-stones. There were plenty of shops,
a large proportion of which appeared to
be those of fruit venders, with piles of
huge watermelons and pumpkins stacked
in front of them ; arid, drawn up before
the shops, or bumping about on the cob-
ble-stones, were innumerable other bas-
ket-phaetons freighted with ladies of high
fashion, who greeted each other from

202

vehicle to vehicle, and conversed on the
edge of the pavement in a manner that
struck Lord Lambeth as demonstrative,
with a great many " Oh, my dears," and
little, quick exclamations and caresses.
His companion went into seventeen shops

— he amused himself with counting them

— and accumulated at the bottom of the
phaeton a pile of bundles that hardly
left the young Englishman a place for
his feet. As she had no groom nor foot-
man, he sat in the phaeton to hold the
ponies, where, although he was not a
particularly acute observer, he saw much
to entertain him — especially the ladies
just mentioned, who wandered tip and
down with the appearance of a kind of
aimless intentness, as if they were looking
for something to buy, and who, tripping
in and out of their vehicles, displayed
remarkably pretty feet. It all seemed to
Lord Lambeth very odd and bright and
gay. Of course, before they got back to
the villa, he had had a great deal of des-
ultory conversation with Bessie Alden.

The young Englishmen spent the whole
of that day and the whole of many sue-
cessive days in what the French call the
intimite of their new friends. They

.MB

gr ; .

•B

agreed that it was extremely jolly, that
they had never known anything more
agreeable. It is not proposed to narrate
minutely the incidents of their sojourn
on this charming shore ; though if it
were convenient I might present a rec-
ord of impressions none the less delec-
table that they were not exhaustively an-
alyzed. Many of them still linger in the
minds of our travellers, attended by a
train of harmonious images — images of
brilliant mornings on lawns and piazzas
that overlooked the sea ; of innumerable
pretty girls ; of infinite lounging and talk-
ing and laughing and flirting and lunch-
ing and dining; of universal friendliness
and frankness; of occasions on which
they knew every one and everything,
and had an extraordinary sense of ease ;
of drives and rides in the late afternoon
over gleaming beaches, on long sea-roads
beneath a sky lighted up by marvellous
sunsets ; of suppers, on the return, infor-
mal, irregular, agreeable ; of evenings at
open windows or on the perpetual ve-
randas, in the summer starlight, above
the warm Atlantic. The young English-
men were introduced to everybody, enter-
tained by everybody, intimate with every-

204

body. At the end of three
days they had removed their
luggage from the hotel, and
gone to stay with Mrs. Westgate
— a step to which Percy Beau-
mont at first offered some conscientious
opposition. I call his opposition conscien-
tious, because it was founded upon some

205

talk that he had had, on the second day,
with Bessie Alden. He had indeed had
a good deal of talk with her, for she was
not literally always in conversation with
Lord Lambeth. He had meditated upon
Mrs. Westgate's account of her sister, and
he discovered for himself that the young
lady was clever, and appeared to have
read a great deal. She seemed very nice,
though he could not make out that, as
Mrs. "Westgate had said, she was shy. If
she was shy, she carried it off very well.

"Mr. Beaumont," she had said, "please
tell me something about Lord Lambeth's
family. How would you say it in Eng-
land— his position ?"

"His position?" Percy Beaumont re-
peated.

" His rank, or whatever you call it.
Unfortunately, we haven't got a 'peer-
age,' like the people in Thackeray."

" That's a great pity," said Beaumont.
" You would find it all set forth there so
much better than I can do it."

" He is a peer, then ?"

" Oh yes, he is a peer."

" And has he any other title than Lord
Lambeth ?"

" His title is the Marquis of Lambeth,"

206

said Beaumont ; and then lie was silent.
Bessie Alden appeared to be looking at
him with interest. " He is the son of
the Duke of Bayswater," he added, pres-
ently.

" The eldest son ?"

" The only son."

" And are his parents living ?"

" Oh yes ; if his father were not living
he would be a duke."

" So that when his father dies," pursued
Bessie Alden, with more simplicity than
might have been expected in a clever girl,
"he will become Duke of Bays water f

" Of course," said Percy Beaumont.
" But his father is in excellent health."

"And his mother?"

Beaumont smiled a little. "The duch-
ess is uncommonly robust."

" And has he any sisters ?"

" Yes, there are two."

" And what are they called ?"

" One of them is married. She is the
Countess of Pimlico."

"And the other?"

" The other is unmarried ; she is plain
Lady Julia."

Bessie Alden looked at him a moment.
" Is she very plain ?"

Beaumont began to laugh again. " You
would not find her so handsome as her
brother," he said ; and it was after this
that he attempted to dissuade the heir of
the Duke of Bayswater from accepting
Mrs. "Westgate's invitation. " Depend
upon it," he said, " that girl means to try
for you."

"It seems to me you are doing your
best to make a fool of me," the modest
young nobleman answered.

" She has been asking me," said Beau-
mont, "all about your people and your
possessions."

" I am sure it is very good of her !"
Lord Lambeth rejoined.

"Well, then," observed his companion,
"if you go, you go with your eyes open."

"D — n my eyes!" exclaimed Lord Lam-
beth. " If one is to be a dozen times a
day at the house, it is a great deal more
convenient to sleep there. I am sick
of travelling up and down this beastly
avenue."

Since he had determined to go, Percy
Beaumont would, of course, have been
very sorry to allow him to go alone ; he
was a man of conscience, and he remem-
bered his promise to the duchess. It

208

was obviously the memory of this prom-
ise that made him say to his companion
a couple of days, later that he rather won-
dered he should be so fond of that girl.

" In the first place, how do you know
how fond I am of her ?" asked Lord Lam-
beth. "And, in the second place, why
shouldn't I be fond of her?"

" I shouldn't think she would be in
your line."

" What do you call my < line ?' You
don't set her down as ' fast ?' "

" Exactly so. Mrs. Westgate tells me
that there is no such thing as the 'fast
girl' in America; that it's an English
invention, and that the term has no mean-
ing here."

" All the better. It's an animal I detest."

" You prefer a blue-stocking."

" Is that what you call Miss Alden ?"

"Her sister tells me," said Percy Beau-
mont, "that she is tremendously literary."

"I don't know anything about that.
She is certainly very clever."

" Well," said Beaumont, " I should have
supposed you would have found that sort
of thing awfully slow."

" In point of fact," Lord Lambeth re-
joined, " I find it uncommonly lively."

209

After this Percy Beaumont held his
tongue ; but on August 10th he wrote
to the Duchess of Bays water. He was,
as I have said, a man of conscience, and
he had a strong, incorruptible sense of
the proprieties of life. His kinsman,
meanwhile, was having a great deal of
talk with Bessie Alden — on the red sea-
rocks beyond the lawn ; in the course of
long island rides, with a slow return in
the glowing twilight ; on the deep veran-
da late in the evening. Lord Lambeth,
who had stayed at many houses, had never
stayed at a house in which it was possible
for a young man to converse so frequently
with a young lady. This young lady no
longer applied to Percy Beaumont for in-
formation concerning his lordship. She
addressed herself directly to the young
nobleman. She asked him a great many
questions, some of which bored him a
little ; for he took no pleasure in talking
about himself.

" Lord Lambeth," said Bessie Alden,
" are you a hereditary legislator ?"

" Oh, I say !" cried Lord Lambeth, "don't
make me call myself such names as that."

" But you are a member of Parliament,"
said the young girl.

210

" I don't like the sound of that, either."

" Don't you sit in the House of Lords ?"
Bessie Alden went on.

" Very seldom," said Lord Lambeth.

"Is it an important position?" she
asked.

" Oh dear no," said Lord Lambeth.

" I should think it would be very
grand," said Bessie Alden, "to possess,
simply by an accident of birth, the right
to make laws for a great nation."

" Ah, but one doesn't make laws. It's
a great humbug."

" I don't believe that," the young girl
declared. " It must be a great privilege,
and I should think that if one thought of
it in the right way — from a high point
of view — it would be very inspiring."

" The less one thinks of it the better,"
Lord Lambeth affirmed.

" I think it's tremendous," said Bessie
Alden ; and on another occasion she asked
him if he had any tenantry. Hereupon
it was that, as I have said, he was a little
bored.

"Do you want to buy up their leases?"
he asked.

" Well, have you got any livings ?" she

demanded.

211

" Oh, I say !" he cried. " Have you
got a clergyman that is looking out?"
But she made him tell her that he had a
castle ; he confessed to but one. It was
the place in which he had been born and
brought up, and, as he had an old-time
liking for it, he was beguiled into de-
scribing it a little, and saying it was really
very jolly. Bessie Alden listened with
great interest, and declared that she would
give the world to see such a place.
Whereupon — "It would be awfully kind
of you to come and stay there," said Lord
Lambeth. He took a vague satisfaction
in the circumstance that Percy Beaumont
had not heard him make the remark I
have just recorded.

Mr. Westgate all this time had not, as
they said at Newport, " come on." His
wife more than once announced that she
expected him on the morrow; but on
the morrow she wandered about a little,
with a telegram in her jewelled fingers,
declaring it was very tiresome that his
business detained him in New York ; that
•he could only hope the Englishmen were

having a good time. " I must say," said
Mrs. Westgate, " that it is no thanks to
him if you are." And she went on to
explain, while she continued that slow-
paced promenade which enabled her well-
adjusted skirts to display themselves so
advantageously, that unfortunately in
America there was no leisure class. It
was Lord Lambeth's theory, freely pro-
pounded when the young men were to-
gether, that Percy Beaumont was having
a very good time with Mrs. "Westgate,
and that, under the pretext of meeting
for the purpose of animated discussion,
they were indulging in practices that
imparted a shade of hypocrisy to the
lady's regret for her husband's absence.

" I assure you we are always discussing
and differing," said Percy Beaumont.
" She is awfully argumentative. Ameri-
can ladies certainly don't mind contra-
dicting you. Upon my word, I don't
think I was ever treated so by a woman
before. She's so devilish positive."

Mrs. Westgate's positive quality, how-
ever, evidently had its attractions, for
Beaumont was constantly at his hostess's
side. He detached himself one day to
the extent of going to New York to talk

213

over the Tennessee Central with Mr.
Westgate ; but he was absent only forty-
eight hours, during which, with Mr. West-
gate's assistance, he completely settled
this piece of business. " They certainly
do things quickly in New York," he ob-
served to his cousin ; and he added that
Mr. Westgate had seemed very uneasy
lest his wife should miss her visitor — he
had been in such an awful hurry to send
him back to her. " I'm afraid you'll
never come up to an American husband,
if that's what the wives expect," he said
to Lord Lambeth.

Mrs. Westgate, however, was not to en-
joy much longer the entertainment with
which an indulgent husband had desired
to keep her provided. On August 21st
Lord Lambeth received a telegram from
his mother, requesting him to return im-
mediately to England ; his father had
been taken ill, and it was his filial duty
to come to him.

The young Englishman was visibly an-
noyed. " What the deuce does it mean ?"
he asked of his kinsman. "What am I
to do?"

Percy Beaumont was annoyed as well ;
he had deemed it his duty, as I have nar-

214

rated, to write to the duchess, but he had
not expected that this distinguished wom-
an would act so promptly upon his hint.
" It means," he said, " that your father is
laid up. I don't suppose it's anything
serious ; but you have no option. Take
the first steamer ; but don't be alarmed."

Lord Lambeth made his farewells ; but
the few last words that he exchanged
with Bessie Alden are the only ones that
have a place in our record. " Of course
I needn't assure you," he said, "that if
you should come to England next year, I
expect to be the first person that you
inform of it."

Bessie Alden looked at him a little and
she smiled. " Oh, if we come to Lon-
don," she answered, " I should think you
would hear of it."

Percy Beaumont returned with his
cousin, and his sense of duty compelled
him, one windless afternoon, in mid-At-
lantic, to say to Lord Lambeth that he
suspected that the .duchess's telegram
was in part the result of something he
himself had written to her. " I wrote to
her — as I explicitly notified you I had
promised to do — that you were extremely
interested in a little American girl."

215

Lord Lambeth was extremely angry,
and he indulged for some moments in
the simple language of indignation. But
I have said that he was a reasonable
young man, and 1 can give no better
proof of it than the fact that he remarked
to his companion at the end of half an
hour, " You were quite right, after all.
I am very much interested in her. Only,
to be fair," he added, " you should have
told my mother also that she is not —
seriously — interested in me."

Percy Beaumont gave a little laugh.
"There is nothing so charming as mod-
esty in a young man in your position.
That speech is a capital proof that you
are sweet on her."

"She is not interested — she is not!"
Lord Lambeth repeated.

" My dear fellow," said his companion,
" you are very far gone."

N point of fact, as Percy
Beaumont would have said, Mrs.
Westgate disembarked on May
18th on the British coast. She
was accompanied by her sister,
but she was not attended by any
other member of her family.
To the deprivation of her husband's so-
ciety Mrs. Westgate was, however, habitu-
ated ; she had made half a dozen journeys
to Europe without him, and she now ac-
counted for his absence, to interrogative
friends on this side of the Atlantic, by al-
lusion to the regrettable but conspicuous
fact that in America there was no leisure
class. The two ladies came up to London
and alighted at Jones's Hotel, where Mrs.
Westgate, who had made on former oc-
casions the most agreeable impression at
this establishment, received an obsequi-

217

ous greeting. Bessie Alden had felt much
excited about coming to England ; she
had expected the " associations " would
be very charming, that it would be an
infinite pleasure to rest her eyes upon
the things she had read about in the poets
and historians. She was very fond of the
poets and historians, of the picturesque,
of the past, of retrospect, of mementos
and reverberations of greatness ; so that
on corning into the great English world,
where strangeness and familiarity would
go hand in hand, she was prepared for
a multitude of fresh emotions. They
began very promptly — these tender, flut-
tering sensations; they began with the
sight of the beautiful English landscape,
whose dark richness was quickened and
brightened by the season ; with the car-
peted fields and flowering hedge-rows, as
she looked at them from the window of
the train ; with the spires of the rural
churches peeping above the rook-haunted
tree -tops; with the oak-studded parks,
the ancient homes, the cloudy light, the
speech, the mariners, the thousand differ-
ences. Mrs. Westgate's impressions had,
of course, much less novelty and keen-
ness, and she gave but a wandering atten-

218

tion to her sister's ejaculations and rhap-
sodies.

" You know my enjoyment of England
is not so intellectual as Bessie's," she said
to several of her friends in the course of
her visit to this country. " And yet if it
is not intellectual, I can't say it is phys-
ical. I don't think I can quite say what
it is — my enjoyment of England." When
once it was settled that the two ladies
should come abroad and should spend a
few weeks in England on their way to
the Continent, they of course exchanged
a good many allusions to their London
acquaintance.

" It will certainly be much nicer hav-
ing friends there," Bessie Alden had said
one day, as she sat on the sunny deck of
the steamer at her sister's feet, on a large
blue rug.

"Whom do you mean by friends?"
Mrs. Westgate asked.

"All those English gentlemen whom
you have known and entertained. Cap-
tain Littledale, for instance. And Lord
Lambeth and Mr. Beaumont," added Bes-
sie Alden.

"Do you expect them to give us a
very grand reception ?"

219

Bessie reflected a moment; she was ad-
dicted, as we know, to reflection. " Well,
yes."

"My poor, sweet child!" murmured her
sister.

"What have I said that is so silly?"
asked Bessie.

" You are a little too simple ; just a
little. It is very becoming, but it pleases
people at your expense."

"I am certainly too simple to under-
stand you," said Bessie.

" Shall I tell you a story ?" asked her
sister.

"If you would be so good. That is
what they do to amuse simple people."

Mrs. Westgate consulted her memory,
while her companion sat gazing at the
shining sea. " Did you ever hear of the
Duke of Green-Erin?"

" I think not," said Bessie.

" Well, it's no matter," her sister went
on.

" It's a proof of my simplicity."

" My story is meant to illustrate that of
some other people," said Mrs. West-
gate. " The Duke of Green-Erin is
what they call in England a great
swell, and some five years ago he came

220

to America. He spent most of his time in
New York, and in New York he spent his
days and his nights at the Butterworths'.
You have heard, at least, of the Butter-
worths. Bien. They did everything in
the world for him — they turned them-
selves inside out. They gave him a doz-
en dinner-parties and balls, and were the
means of his being invited to fifty more.
At first he used to come into Mrs. Butter-
worth's box at the opera in a tweed trav-
elling suit ; but some one stopped that.
At any rate, he had a beautiful time, and
they parted the best friends in the world.
Two years elapse, and the Butterworths
come abroad and go to London. The
first thing they see in all the papers — in
England those things are in the most
prominent place — is that the Duke of
Green-Erin has arrived in town for the
season. They wait a little, and then Mr.
Butterworth — as polite as ever — goes
and leaves a card. They wait a little
more ; the visit is not returned ; they
wait three weeks — silence de mort — the
duke gives no sign. The Butterworths
see a lot of other people, put down the
Duke of Green-Erin as a rude, ungrate-
ful man, and forget all about him. One

221

fine day they go to the Ascot races, and
there they meet him face to face. He
stares a moment, and then comes tip to
Mr. Butterworth, taking something from
his pocket-book — something which proves
to be a bank-note. ' I'm glad to see you,
Mr. Butterworth,' he says, ' so that I can
pay you that £10 I lost to you in ~New
York. I saw the other day you remem-
bered our bet; here are the £10, Mr.
Butterworth. Good-bye, Mr. Butter-
worth.' And off he goes, and that's the
last they see of the Duke of Green-Erin."

" Is that your story ?" asked Bessie
Alden.

" Don't you think it's interesting?" her
sister replied.

" I don't believe it," said the young girl.

"Ah," cried Mrs. Westgate, " you are
not so simple, after all! Believe it or
not, as you please ; there is no smoke
without fire."

" Is that the way," asked Bessie, after
a moment, " that you expect your friends
to treat you ?"

" I defy them to treat me very ill, be-
cause I shall not give them the oppor-
tunity. With the best will in the world,
in that case they can't be very offensive."

Bessie Alden was silent a moment. "I
don't see what makes you talk that way,"
she said. " The English are a great peo-
ple."

"Exactly; and that is just the way
they have grown great — by dropping you
when you have ceased to be useful. Peo-
ple say they are not clever; but I think
they are very clever."

" You know you have liked them — all
the Englishmen you have seen," said
Bessie.

"They have liked me," her sister re-
joined ; " it would be more correct to
say that. And, of course, one likes that."

Bessie Alden resumed for some mo-
ments her studies in sea-green. "Well,"
she said, " whether they like me or not, I
mean to like them. And, happily," she
added, " Lord Lambeth does not owe me
£10."

During the first few days after their
arrival at Jones's Hotel our charming
Americans were much occupied with
what they would have called looking
about them. They found occasion to
make a large number of purchases, and
their opportunities for conversation were
such only as were offered by the defer-

223

ential London shopmen. Bessie Alden,
even in driving from the station, took an
immense fancy to the British metropolis,
and at the risk of exhibiting her as a
young woman of vulgar tastes, it must
be recorded that for a considerable period
she desired no higher pleasure than to
drive about the crowded streets in a han-
som cab. To her attentive eyes they were
full of a strange, picturesque life, and it
is at least beneath the dignity of our his-
toric muse to enumerate the trivial ob-
jects and incidents which this simple
young lady from Boston found so enter-
taining. It may be freely mentioned,
however, that whenever, after a round of
visits in Bond Street and Regent Street,
she was about to return with her sister
to Jones's Hotel, she made an earnest
request that they should be driven home
by way of Westminster Abbey. She had
begun by asking whether it would not
be possible to take in the Tower on the
way to their lodgings ; but it happened
that at a more primitive stage of her
culture Mrs. Westgate had paid a visit
to this venerable monument, which she
spoke of ever afterwards vaguely as a
dreadful disappointment ; so that she ex-

224

pressed the liveliest disapproval of any
attempt to combine historical researches
with the purchase of hair -brushes and
note-paper. The most she would consent
to do in this line was to spend half an
hour at Madame Tussaud's, where she saw
several dusty wax effigies of members of
the royal family. She told Bessie that
if she wished to go to the Tower she
must get some one else to take her.
Bessie expressed hereupon an earnest dis-
position to go alone ; but upon this pro-
posal as well, Mrs. Westgate sprinkled
cold water.

" Remember," she said, " that you are
not in your innocent little Boston. It is
not a question of walking up and down
Beacon Street." Then she went on to
explain that there were two classes of
American girls in Europe — those that
walked about alone and those that did
not. " You happen to belong, my dear,"
she said to her sister, " to the class that
does not."

" It is only," answered Bessie, laugh-
ing, "because you happen to prevent
me." And she devoted much private
meditation to this question of effecting a
visit to the Tower of London.

225

Suddenly it seemed as if the problem
might be solved ; the two ladies at Jones's
Hotel received a visit from Willie Wood-
ley. Such was the social appellation of
a young American who had sailed from
New York a few days after their own
departure, and who, having the privilege
of intimacy with them in that city, had
lost no time, on his arrival in London, in
coming to pay them his respects. He
had, in fact, gone to see them directly
after going to see his tailor, than which
there can be no greater exhibition of
promptitude on the part of a young
American who had just alighted at the
Charing Cross Hotel. He was a slim,
pale youth, of the most amiable dispo-
sition, famous for the skill with which
he led the " German " in 'New York.
Indeed, by the young ladies who habitu-
ally figured in this Terpsichorean revel
he was believed to be " the best dancer
in the world ;" it was in these terms that
he was always spoken of, and that his
identity was indicated. He was the gen-
tlest, softest young man it was possible
to meet ; he was beautifully dressed —
"in the English style" — and he knew
an immense deal about London. He

226

had been at Newport during the previ-
ous summer, at the time of our young
Englishmen's visit, and he took extreme
pleasure in the society of Bessie Alden,
whom he always addressed as " Miss Bes-
sie." She immediately arranged with
him, in the presence of her sister, that lie
should conduct her to the scene of Anne
Boleyn's execution.

" You may do as you please," said Mrs.
Westgate. " Only — if you desire the in-
formation— it is not the custom here for
young ladies to knock about London with
young men."

" Miss Bessie has waltzed with me
so often," observed Willie Woodley ;
"she can surely go out with me in a
hansom !"

"I consider waltzing," said Mrs.
Westgate, " the most innocent pleasure
of our time."

"It's a compliment to our time!"
exclaimed the young man, with a little
laugh in spite of himself.

"I don't see why I should regard
what is done here," said Bessie Alden.
"Why should I suffer the restrictions
of a society of which I enjoy none of
the privileges?"

227

" That's very good — very good," mur-
mured Willie Woodley.

" Oh, go to the Tower, and feel the
axe, if you like," said Mrs. Westgate. " I
consent to your going with Mr. Woodley ;
but I should not let you go with an Eng-
lishman."

" Miss Bessie wouldn't care to go with
an Englishman !" Mr. Woodley declared,
with a faint asperity that was, perhaps,
not unnatural in a young man, who, dress-
ing in the manner that I have indicated,
and knowing a great deal, as I have said,
about London, saw no reason for drawing
these sharp distinctions. He agreed upon
a day with Miss Bessie — a day of that
same week.

An ingenious mind might, perhaps,
trace a connection between the young
girl's allusion to her destitution of social
privileges and a question she asked on
the morrow, as she sat with her sister at
lunch.

" Don't you mean to write to — to any
one?" said Bessie.

" I wrote this morning to Captain Lit-
tledale," Mrs. Westgate replied.

"But Mr. Woodley said that Captain
Littledale had gone to India."

228

" He said he thought he had heard so ;
he knew nothing about it."

For a moment Bessie Alden said noth-
ing more ; then, at last, " And don't you
intend to write to — to Mr. Beaumont?"
she inquired.

" You mean to Lord Lambeth," said
her sister.

" I said Mr. Beaumont, because he was
so good a friend of yours."

Mrs. Westgate looked at the young
girl with sisterly candor. " I don't care
two straws for Mr. Beaumont."

" You were certainly very nice to him."

" I am nice to every one," said Mrs.
Westgate, simply.

" To every one but me," rejoined
Bessie, smiling.

Her sister continued to look at her;
then, at last, " Are you in love with Lord
Lambeth?" she asked.

The young girl stared a moment, and
the question was apparently too humor-
ous even to make her blush. " Not that
I know of," she answered.

229

" Because, if you are," Mrs. Westgate
went on, " I shall certainly not send for
him."

" That proves what I said," declared
Bessie, smiling — " that you are not nice
to me."

" It would be a poor service, my dear
child," said her sister.

"In what sense? There is nothing
against Lord Lambeth that I know of."

Mrs. Westgate was silent a moment.
" You are in love writh him, then ?"

Bessie stared again ; but this time she
blushed a little. " Ah ! if you won't be
serious," she answered, " we will not men-
tion him again."

For some moments Lord Lambeth was
not mentioned again, and it was Mrs.
Westgate who, at the end of this period,
reverted to him. " Of course I will let
him know we are here, because 1 think
he would be hurt — justly enough — if we
should go away without seeing him. It
is fair to give him a chance to come and
thank me for the kindness we showed
him. But I don't want to seem eager."

"Neither do I," said Bessie, with a
little laugh.

" Though I confess," added her sister,

230

"that I am curious to see how he will
behave."

" He behaved very well at Newport."

" Newport is not London. At New-
port he could do as he liked ; but here it
is another affair. He has to have an eye
to consequences."

"If he had more freedom, then, at
Newport," argued Bessie, " it is the more
to his credit that he behaved well ; and if
he has to be so careful here, it is possible
he will behave even better."

"Better — better," repeated her sister.
" My dear child, what is your point of
view ?"

"How do you mean — my point of
view ?"

" Don't you care for Lord Lambeth — a
little?"

This time Bessie Alden was displeased ;
she slowly got up from the table, turning
her face away from her sister. " You
will oblige me by not talking so," she
said.

Mrs. Westgate sat watching her for
some moments as she moved slowly about
the room and went and stood at the win-
dow. "I will write to him this after-
noon," she said at last.

" Do as you please !" Bessie answered ;
and presently she turned round. " I am
not afraid to say that I like Lord Lam-
beth. I like him very much."

" He is not clever," Mrs. Westgate de-
clared.

"Well, there have been clever people
whom I have disliked," said Bessie Alden ;
" so that I suppose I may like a stupid
one. Besides, Lord Lambeth is not
stupid."

" Not so stupid as he looks !" exclaimed
her sister, smiling.

" If I were in love with Lord Lambeth,
as you said just now, it would be bad
policy on your part to abuse him."

" My dear child, don't give me lessons
in policy !" cried Mrs. Westgate. " The
policy I mean to follow is very deep."

The young girl began to walk about
the room again ; then she stopped before
her sister. " I have never heard in the
course of five minutes," she said, " so
many hints and innuendoes. I wish you
would tell me in plain English what you
mean."

"I mean that you may be much an-
noyed."

" That is still only a hint," said Bessie.

Her sister looked at her, hesitating an
instant. " It will be said of you that you
have come after Lord Lambeth — that you
followed him."

Bessie Alden threw back her pretty
head like a startled hind, and a look flashed
into her face that made Mrs. Westgate
rise from her chair. "Who says such
things as that?" she demanded.

"People here."

" I don't believe it," said Bessie.

" You have a very convenient faculty
of doubt. But my policy will be, as I
say, very deep. I shall leave you to find
out this kind of thing for yourself."

Bessie fixed her eyes upon her sister,
and Mrs. Westgate thought for a mo-
ment there were tears in them. "Do
they talk that way here ?" she asked.

" You will see. I shall leave you
alone."

"Don't leave me alone," said Bessie Al-
den. " Take me away."

" No ; I want to see what you make of
it," her sister continued.

" I don't understand."

" You will understand after Lord Lam-
beth has come," said Mrs. Westgate, with
a little laugh.

233

The two ladies had arranged that on
this afternoon Willie Woodley should go
with them to Hyde Park, where Bessie
Alden expected to derive much entertain-
ment from sitting on a little green chair,
under the great trees, beside Rotten Row.
The want of a suitable escort had hitherto
rendered this pleasure inaccessible ; but
no escort now, for such an expedition,
could have been more suitable than their
devoted young countryman, whose mis-
sion in life, it might almost be said, was
to find chairs for ladies, and who appeared
on the stroke of half past five with a
white camellia in his button-hole.

" I have written to Lord Lambeth, my
dear," said Mrs. Westgate to her sister,
on coining into the room where Bessie
Alden, drawing on her long gray gloves,
was entertaining their visitor.

Bessie said nothing, but Willie Wood-
ley exclaimed that his lordship was in
town ; he had seen his name in the Morn-
ing Post.

"Do you read the Morning Post?"
asked Mrs. Westgate.

"Oh yes ; it's great fun," Willie Wood-
ley affirmed.
"I want so to see it," said Bes-

234

sie ; " there is so much about it in Thack-
eray."

" I will send it to you every morning,"
said Willie Woodley.

He found them what Bessie Alden
thought excellent places, under the great
trees, beside the famous avenue whose
humors had been made familiar to the
young girl's childhood by the pictures in
Punch. The day was bright and warm,
and the crowd of riders and spectators,
and the great procession of carriages,
were proportionately dense and brilliant.
The scene bore the stamp of the London
Season at its height, and Bessie Alden
found more entertainment in it than she
was able to express to her companions.
She sat silent, under her parasol, and her
imagination, according to its wont, let it-
self loose into the great changing assem-
blage of striking and suggestive figures.
They stirred up a host of old impressions
and preconceptions, and she found her-
self fitting a history to this person and a
theory to that, and making a place for
them all in her little private museum of
types. But if she said little, her sister on
one side and Willie Woodley on the other
expressed themselves in lively alternation.

"Look at that green dress with blue
flounces," said Mrs. Westgate. " Qudle
toilette /"

" That's the Marquis of Blackborough,"
said the young man — "the one in the
white coat. I heard him speak the other
night in the House of Lords ; it was some-
thing about ramrods; he called them
wamwods. He's an awful swell."

"Did you ever see anything like the
way they are pinned back ?" Mrs. West-
gate resumed. " They never know where
to stop."

"They do nothing but stop," said
Willie Woodley. "It prevents them
from walking. Here comes a great ce-
lebrity, Lady Beatrice Bellevue. She's
awfully fast ; see what little steps she
takes."

" Well, my dear," Mrs. Westgate pur-
sued, " I hope you are getting some ideas
for your couturiere ?"

" I am getting plenty of ideas," said
Bessie, " but I don't know that my cou-
turiere would appreciate them."

Willie Woodley presently perceived a
friend on horseback, who drove up beside
the barrier of the Row and beckoned to
him. He went forward, and the crowd

236

of pedestrians closed about him, so that
for some ten minutes he was hidden from
sight. At last he reappeared, bringing
a gentleman with him — a gentleman
whom Bessie at first supposed to be his
friend dismounted. But at a second
glance she found herself looking at Lord
Lambeth, who was shaking hands with
her sister.

" I found him over there," said
Willie Woodley, _^

"and I told him you
were here."

And then Lord
Lambeth, touching
his hat a little, shook
hands with Bessie.
"Fancy your being
here!" he said. He
was blushing and
smiling; he look-
ed very hand-
some, and he had
a kind of splen-
dor that he had not had in America. Bes-
sie Alden's imagination, as we know, was
just then in exercise; so that the tall
young Englishman, as he stood there look-
ing down at her, had the benefit of it.

237

" He is handsomer and more splendid
than anything I have ever seen," she said
to herself. And then she remembered
that he was a marquis, and she thought he
looked like a marquis.

" I say, you know," he cried, " you
ought to have let a man know you were
here!"

" I wrote to you an hour ago," said
Mrs. Westgate.

" Doesn't all the world know it '?" asked
Bessie, smiling.

" I assure you I didn't know it !" cried
Lord Lambeth. " Upon my honor, I
hadn't heard of it. Ask Woodley, now ;
had I, Woodley?"

" Well, T think you are rather a hum-
bug," said Willie Woodley.

" You don't believe that — do you, Miss
Alderi ?" asked his lordship. " You don't
believe I'm a humbug, eh ?"

" No," said Bessie, " I don't."

" You are too tall to stand up, Lord Lam-
beth," Mrs. Westgate observed. "You
are only tolerable when you sit down.
Be so good as to get a chair."

He found a chair and placed it side-
wise, close to the two ladies. "If I
hadn't met Woodley I should never have

238

found you," he went on. " Should I,
Woodley ?"

" Well, I guess not," said the young
American.

" Not even with my letter ?" asked Mrs.
Westgate.

" Ah, well, I haven't got your letter
yet ; I suppose I shall get it this even-
ing. It was awfully kind of you to
write."

"So I said to Bessie," observed Mrs.
Westgate.

" Did she say so, Miss Alden ?" Lord
Lambeth inquired. "I dare say you
have been here a month."

"We have been here three," said Mrs.
Westgate.

" Have you been here three
months ?" the young man
asked again of Bessie.

"It seems a long time,"
Bessie answered.

" I say, after that you had
better not call me a
humbug !" cried Lord
Lambeth. " I have
only been in town
three weeks; but you
must have been hid-

ing away ; I haven't seen you any-
where."

" Where should you have seen us —
where should we have gone ?" asked Mrs.
Westgate.

"You should have gone to Ilurling-
ham," said Woodley.

" No ; let Lord Lambeth tell us," Mrs.
Westgate insisted.

" There are plenty of places to go to,"
said Lord Lambeth ; " each one stupider
than the other. I mean people's houses ;
they send you cards."

" ~No one has sent us cards," said Bessie.

" We are very quiet," her sister de-
clared. " We are here as travellers."

" We have been to Madame Tussaud's,"
Bessie pursued.

" Oh, I say !" cried Lord Lambeth.

" We thought we should find your im-
age there," said Mrs. Westgate — " yours
and Mr. Beaumont's."

" In the Chamber of Horrors ?" laughed
the young man.

"It did duty very well for a party,"
said Mrs. Westgate. " All the women
were decolletees, and many of the figures
looked as if they could speak if they
tried."

240

"Upon my word," Lord Lambeth re-
joined, " you see people at London parties
that look as if they couldn't speak if they
tried."

" Do yon think Mr. Woodley could find
us Mr. Beaumont ?" asked Mrs. Westgate.

Lord Lambeth stared and looked round
him. " I dare say he could. Beaumont
often comes here. Don't you think you
could find him, Woodley ? Make a dive
into the crowd."

" Thank you ; I have had enough div-
ing," said Willie Woodley. " I will wait
till Mr. Beaumont comes to the surface."

"I will bring him to see you," said
Lord Lambeth; "where are you stay-
ing?"

u You will find the address in my let-
ter— Jones's Hotel."

"Oh, one of those places just out of
Piccadilly ? Beastly hole, isn't it ?" Lord
Lambeth inquired.

"I believe it's the best hotel in London,"
said Mrs. Westgate.

" But they give you awful rubbish to
eat, don't they ?" his lordship went on.

" Yes," said Mrs. Westgate.

" I always feel so sorry for the people
that come up to town and go to live in

241

those places," continued the young man.
" They eat nothing but filth."

" Oh, I say !" cried Willie Woodley.

" Well, how do you like London, Miss
Alden ?" Lord Lambeth asked, unper-
turbed by this ejaculation.

" I think it's grand," said Bessie Alden.

"My sister likes it, in spite of the
1 filth!'" Mrs. Westgate exclaimed.

" I hope you are going to stay a long
time."

" As long as I can," said Bessie.

" And where is Mr. Westgate ?" asked
Lord Lambeth of this gentleman's wife.

" He's where he always is — in that tire-
some New York."

"He must be tremendously clever,"
said the young man.

" I suppose he is," said Mrs. Westgate.

Lord Lambeth sat for nearly an hour
with his American friends ; but it is not
our purpose to relate their conversation in
full. He addressed a great many remarks
to Bessie Alden, and finally turned tow-
ards her altogether, while Willie Wood-
ley entertained Mrs. Westgate. Bessie
herself said very little ; she was on her
guard, thinking of what her sister had said
to her at lunch. Little by little, however,

242

she intersted herself in Lord Lambeth
again, as she had done at Newport ; only
it seemed to her that here he might be-
come more interesting. He would be an
unconscious part of the antiquity, the im-
pressiveness, the picturesqneness, of Eng-
land ; and poor Bessie Alden, like many
a Yankee maiden, was terribly at the
mercy of picturesqueness.

" I have often wished I were at New-
port again," said the young man. " Those
days I spent at your sister's were awfully

jolly."

" We enjoyed them very much ; I hope
your father is better."

" Oh dear, yes. When I got to Eng-
land he was out grouse-shooting. It was
what you call in America a gigantic fraud.
My mother had got nervous. My three
weeks at Newport seemed like a happy
dream."

"America certainly is very different
from England," said Bessie.

" I hope you like England better, eh ?"
Lord Lambeth rejoined, almost persua-
sively.

" No Englishman can ask that seriously
of a person of another country."

Her companion looked at her for a

243

moment. "You mean it's a matter of
course ?"

"If I were English," said Bessie, "it
would certainly seem to me a matter of
course that every one should be a good
patriot."

" Oh dear, yes, patriotism is every-
thing," said Lord Lambeth, not quite
following, but very contented. " Now,
what are you going to do here ?"

" On Thursday I am going to the
Tower."

" The Tower?"

" The Tower of London. Did you
never hear of it ?"

" Oh yes, I have been there," said Lord
Lambeth. "I was taken there by my
governess when I was six years old. It's
a rum idea, your going there."

" Do give me a few more rum ideas,"
said Bessie. " I want to see everything
of that sort. I am going to Hampton
Court, and to Windsor, and to the Dul-
wich Gallery."

Lord Lambeth seemed greatly amused.
" I wonder you don't go to the Rosher-
ville Gardens."

" Are they interesting ?" asked Bessie.

" Oh, wonderful !"

244

" Are they very old ? That's all I care
for," said Bessie.

u They are tremendously old ; they are
falling to ruins."

" I think there is nothing so charming
as an old ruinous garden," said the young
girl. " We must certainly go there."

Lord Lambeth broke out into merri-
ment. " I say, Woodley," lie cried," here's
Miss Alden wants to go to the Kosher-
ville Gardens !"

Willie Woodley looked a little blank ;
he was caught in the fact of ignorance of
an apparently conspicuous feature of Lon-
don life. But in a moment he turned it
off. " Very well," he said, " I'll write
for a permit."

Lord Lambeth's exhilaration increased.
" Gad, I believe you Americans would go
anywhere !" he cried.

"We wish to go to Parliament," said
Bessie. " That's one of the first things."

" Oh, it would bore you to death !"
cried the young man.

" We wish to hear you speak."

"I never speak — except to young la-
dies," said Lord Lambeth, smiling.

Bessie Alden looked at him a while,
smiling, too, in the shadow of her para-

245

sol. " You are very strange," she mur-
mured. "I don't think I approve of
yon."

"Ah, now, don't be severe, Miss Al-
den," said Lord Larnbeth, smiling still
more. " Please don't be severe. I want
you to like me — awfully."

" To like you awfully ? You must not
laugh at me, then, when I make mistakes.
I consider it my right, as a free-born
American, to make as many mistakes as
I choose."

"Upon my word I didn't laugh at
you," said Lord Lambeth.

" And not only that," Bessie went on ;
" but I hold that all my mistakes shall be
set down to my credit. You must think
the better of me for them."

" I can't think better of you than I do,"
the young man declared.

Bessie Alden looked at him a moment.
" You certainly speak very well to young
ladies. But why don't you address the
House ?— isn't that what they call it ?"

" Because I have nothing to say," said
Lord Lambeth.

" Haven't you a great position ?" asked
Bessie Alden.

He looked a moment at the back of his

glove. " I'll set that down," he said, " as
one of your mistakes — to your credit."
And as if he disliked talking about his
position, he changed the subject. " I
wish you would let me go with you to
the Tower, and to Hampton Court, and
to all those other places."

" We shall be most happy," said Bessie.

"And of course I shall be delighted to
show you the House of Lords — some day
that suits you. There are a lot of things
I want to do for you. I want to make
you have a good time. And I should
like very much to present some of my
friends to you, if it wouldn't bore you.
Then it would be awfully kind of you to
come down to Branches."

"We are much obliged to you, Lord
Lambeth," said Bessie.
"What is Branches?"

"It's a house in the
country. I think you
might like it."

Willie Woodley and
Mrs. Westgate at this

**/

moment were sitting in silence, and the
young man's ear caught these last words
of Lord Lambeth's. " Pie's inviting Miss
Bessie to one of his castles," he murmured
to his companion.

Mrs. Westgate, foreseeing what she
mentally called " complications," imme-
diately got up ; and the two ladies, tak-
ing leave of Lord Lambeth, returned,
under Mr. Woodley's conduct, to Jones's
Hotel.

Lord Lambeth came to see them on the
morrow, bringing Percy Beaumont with
him — the latter having instantly declared
his intention of neglecting none of the
usual offices of civility. This declaration,
however, when his kinsman informed
him of the advent of their American
friends, had been preceded by another
remark.

"Here they are, then, and you are in
for it."

" What am I in for ?" demanded Lord
Lambeth.

" I will let your mother give it a name.
With all respect to whom," added Percy
Beaumont, " I must decline on this occa-
sion to do any more police duty. Her
Grace must look after you herself."

248

" I will give her a chance,'1 said her
Grace's son, a trifle grimly. " I shall
make her go and see them."

" She won't do it, my boy."

" We'll see if she doesn't," said Lord
Lambeth.

But if Percy Beaumont took a sombre
view of the arrival of the two ladies at
Jones's Hotel, he was sufficiently a man
of the world to offer them a smiling
countenance. He fell into animated con-
versation— conversation, at least, that was
animated on her side — with Mrs. West-
gate, while his companion made himself
agreeable to the young lady. Mrs. West-
gate began confessing and protesting, de-
claring and expounding.

"1 must say London is a great deal
brighter and prettier just now than when
I was here last — in the month of Novem-
ber. There is evidently a great deal going
on, and you seem to have a good many
flowers. I have no doubt it is very
charming for all you people, and that you
amuse yourselves immensely. It is very
good of you to let Bessie and me come
and sit and look at you. I suppose you
think I am satirical, but I must confess
that that's the feeling I have in London."

249

" I am afraid I don't quite understand
to what feeling you allude," said Percy
Beaumont.

" The feeling that it's all very well for
you English people. Everything is beau-
tifully arranged for you."

"It seems to me it is very well for
some Americans, sometimes," rejoined
Beaumont.

" For some of them, yes — if they like
to be patronized. But I must say I don't
like to be patronized. I may be very
eccentric and undisciplined and outra-
geous, but I confess I never was fond of
patronage. I like to associate with peo-
ple on the same terms as I do in my own
country ; that's a peculiar taste that I have.
But here people seem to expect something
else — Heaven knows what ! I am afraid
you will think I am very ungrateful, for
I certainly have received a great deal of
attention. The last time I was here, a
lady sent me a message that I was at
liberty to come and see her."

" Dear me ! I hope you didn't go," ob-
served Percy Beaumont.

" You are deliciously naive, I must say
that for you !" Mrs. Westgate exclaimed.
"It must be a great advantage to you

250

here in London. I suppose if I myself
had a little more naivete, I should enjoy it
more. I should be content to sit on a chair
in the park, and see the people pass, arid be
told that this is the Duchess of Suffolk, and
that is the Lord Chamberlain, and that I
must be thankful for the privilege of be-
holding them. I dare say it is very wicked
and critical of me to ask for anything else.
But I was always critical, and I freely
confess to the sin of being fastidious. I
am told there is some remarkably supe-
rior second-rate society provided here for
strangers. Merci ! I don't want any su-
perior second-rate society. I want the
society that I have been accustomed to."

" I hope you don't call Lambeth and
me second-rate," Beaumont interposed.

" Ob, I am accustomed to yon," said
Mrs. Westgate. " Do you know that you
English sometimes make the most won-
derful speeches? The first time I came
to London I went out to dine — as I told
you, I have received a great deal of at-
tention. After dinner, in the drawing-
room I had some conversation with an
old lady ; I assure you I had. I forget
what we talked about, but she presently
said, in allusion to something we were

251

discussing, ' Oh, you know, the aristoc-
racy do so-and-so ; but in one's own class
of life it is very different.' In one's own
class of life ! What is a poor unprotected
American woman to do in a country
where she is liable to have that sort of
thing said to her ?"

" You seem to get hold of some very
queer old ladies; I compliment you on
your acquaintance !" Percy Beaumont ex-
claimed. "If you are trying to bring
me to admit that London is an odious
place, you'll not succeed. I'm extremely
fond of it, and I think it the jolliest
place in the world."

" Pour vous autres. I never said the

contrary," Mrs. Westgate retorted. I
make use of this expression, because both
interlocutors had begun to raise their
voices. Percy Beaumont naturally did
not like to hear his country abused, and
Mrs. Westgate, no less naturally, did not
like a stubborn debater.

" Hallo !" said Lord Lambeth ; " what
are they up to now ?" And he came
away from the window, where he had
been standing with Bessie Alden.

"I quite agree with a very clever
countrywoman of mine," Mrs. Westgate
continued, with charming ardor, though
with imperfect relevancy. She smiled at
the two gentlemen for a moment with
terrible brightness, as if to toss at their
feet — upon their native heath — the gaunt-
let of defiance. " For me there are only
two social positions worth speaking of —
that of an American lady, and that of the
Emperor of Russia."

" And what do you do with the Ameri-
can gentlemen ?" asked Lord Lambeth.

" She leaves them in America !" said
Percy Beaumont.

On the departure of their visitors,
Bessie Alden told her sister that Lord
Lambeth would come the next day, to go

253

with them to the Tower, and that lie had
kindly offered to bring his "trap," and
drive them thither.

Mrs. Westgate listened in silence to
this communication, and for some time
afterwards she said nothing. But at last :
" If you had not requested me the oth-
er day not to mention it," she began,
"there is something I should venture
to ask you." Bessie frowned a little ;
her dark blue eyes were more dark than
blue. But her sister went on. " As it
is, I will take the risk. You are not in
love with Lord Lambeth: I believe it,
perfectly. Yery good. But is there, by
chance, any danger of your becoming so ?
It's a very simple question ; don't take
offence. I have a particular reason," said
Mrs. Westgate, " for wanting to know."

Bessie Alden for some moments said
nothing ; she only looked displeased.
" ISTo ; there is no danger," she answered
at last, curtly

" Then I should like to frighten them,"
declared Mrs. Westgate, clasping her
jewelled hands.

" To frighten whom ?"

" All these people ; Lord Lambeth's
family and friends."

254

"How should you frighten them?"
asked the young girl.

"It wouldn't be I — it would be you.
It would frighten them to think that you
should absorb his lordship's young affec-
tions."

Bessie Alden, with her clear eyes still
overshadowed by her dark brows, con-
tinued to interrogate. " Why should that
frighten them?"

Mrs. "VYestgate poised her answer with
a smile before delivering it. " Because
they think you are not good enough.
You are a charming girl, beautiful and
amiable, intelligent and clever, and as
bien-elevee as it is possible to be ; but
you are not a fit match for Lord Lam-
beth."

Bessie Alden was decidedly disgusted.
" Where do you get such extraordinary
ideas ?" she asked. " You have said some
such strange things lately. My dear
Kitty, where do you collect them ?"

Kitty was evidently enamoured of her
idea. " Yes, it would put them on pins
and needles, and it wouldn't hurt you.
Mr. Beaumont is already most uneasy ; I
could soon see that."

The young girl meditated a moment.

255

" Do you mean that they spy upon him—
that they interfere with him ?"

" I don't know what power they have
to interfere, but I know that a British
mamma may worry her son's life out."

It has been intimated that, as regards
certain disagreeable things, Bessie Alden
had a fund of scepticism. She abstained
on the present occasion from expressing
disbelief, for she wished not to irritate
her sister. But she said to herself that
Kitty had been misinformed — that this
was a traveller's tale. Though she was a
girl of a lively imagination, there could in
the nature of things be, to her sense, no
reality in the idea of her belonging to a
vulgar category. What she said aloud
was, " I must say that in that case I am
very sorry for Lord Lambeth."

Mrs. Westgate, more and more exhila-
rated by her scheme, was smiling at her
again. " If I could only believe it was
safe !" she exclaimed. " When you be-
gin to pity him, I, on my side, am
afraid."

"Afraid of what?"

" Of your pitying him too much."

Bessie Alden turned away impatiently;
but at the end of a minute she turned

256

back. " What if I should pity him too
much?" she asked.

Mrs. Westgate hereupon turned away,
but after a moment's reflection she also
faced her sister again. " It would come,
after all, to the same thing," she said.

Lord Lambeth came the next day with
his trap, and the two ladies, attended by
Willie Woodley, placed themselves under
his guidance, and were conveyed east-
ward, through some of the dusker por-
tions of the metropolis, to the great tur-
reted donjon which overlooks the London
shipping. They all descended from their
vehicle and entered the famous enclosure ;
and they secured the services of a vener-
able beef -eater, who, though there were
many other claimants for legendary in-
formation, made a fine exclusive party of
them, and marched them through courts
and corridors, through armories and pris-
ons. He delivered his usual peripatetic
discourse, and they stopped and stared,
and peeped and stooped, according to the
official admonitions. Bessie Alden asked
the old man in the crimson doublet a
great many questions; she thought it a
most fascinating place. Lord Lambeth
was in high good -humor; he was con-

257

stantly laughing; lie enjoyed what he
would have called the lark. Willie Wood-
ley kept looking at the ceilings and tap-
ping the walls with the knuckle of a pearl-
gray glove ; and Mrs. Westgate, asking
at frequent intervals to be allowed to sit
down and wait till they came back, was
as frequently informed that they would
never come back. To a great many of
Bessie's questions — chiefly on collateral
points of English history — the ancient
warder was naturally unable to reply;
whereupon she always appealed to Lord
Lambeth. But his lordship was very
ignorant. He declared that he knew
nothing about that sort of thing, and he
seemed greatly diverted at being treated
as an authority.

" You can't expect every one to know
as much as you," he said.

" I should expect you to know a great
deal more," declared Bessie Alden.

" Women always know more than men
about names and dates, and that sort of
thing," Lord Lambeth rejoined. "There
was Lady Jane Grey we have just been
hearing about, who went in for Latin
and Greek, and all the learning of her
age."

" You have no right to be ignorant, at
all events," said Bessie.

" Why haven't I as good a right as any
one else ?"

"Because you have lived in the midst
of all these things."

" What things do you mean ? Axes,
and blocks, and thumb-screws?"

" All these historical things. You be-
long to a historical family."

"Bessie is really too historical," said
Mrs. Westgate, catching a word of this
dialogue.

".Yes, you are too historical," said Lord
Lambeth, laughing, but thankful for a
formula. " Upon my honor, you are too
historical !"

He went with the ladies a couple of days
later to Hampton Court, Willie Woodley

259

being also of the party. The afternoon
was charming, the famous horse -chest-
nuts were in blossom, and Lord Lambeth,
who quite entered into the spirit of the
cockney excursionist, declared that it was
a jolly old place. Bessie Alden was in
ecstasies; she went about murmuring and
exclaiming.

" It's too lovely," said the young girl ;
"it's too enchanting; it's too exactly
what it ought to be !"

At Hampton Court the little flocks of
visitors are not provided with an official
bell-wether, but are left to browse at dis-
cretion upon the local antiquities. It
happened in this manner that, in default
of another informant, Bessie Alden, who
on doubtful questions was able to suggest
a great many alternatives, found herself
again applying for intellectual assistance
to Lord Lambeth. But he again assured
her that he was utterly helpless in such
matters — that his education had been
sadly neglected.

"And I am sorry it makes you un-
happy," he added, in a moment.

"You are very disappointing, Lord
Lambeth," she said.

" Ah, now, don't say that !" he cried.

260

" That's the worst thing you could possi-
bly say."

"No," she rejoined, "it is not so bad
as to say that I had expected nothing of
you."

" I don't know. Give me a notion of
the sort of thing you expected."

" Well," said Bessie Alden, " that you
would be more what I should like to be —
what I should try to be — in your place."

" Ah, my place !" exclaimed Lord Lam-
beth. "You are always talking about
my place !"

The young girl looked at him ; he
thought she colored a little ; and for a
moment she made no rejoinder.

" Does it strike you that I am always
talking about your place?" she asked.

" I am sure you do it a great honor,"
he said, fearing he had been uncivil.

" I have often thought about it," she
went on, after a moment. " I have often
thought about your being a hereditary
legislator. A hereditary legislator ought
to know a great many things."

" Not if he doesn't legislate."

"But you do legislate ; it's absurd your
saying you don't. You are very much
looked up to here — I am assured of that."

261

"I don't know that I ever noticed
it,"

"It is because you are used to it, then.
You ought to fill the place."

" How do you mean to fill it ?" asked
Lord Lambeth.

" You ought . to be very clever and
brilliant, and to know almost everything."

Lord Lambeth looked at her a mo-
ment. " Shall I tell you something ?" he
asked. "A young man in my position,
as you call it —

" I didn't invent the term," interposed
Bessie Alden. " I have seen it in a great
many books."

"Hang it! you are always at your
books. A fellow in my position, then,
does very well whatever he does. That's
about what I mean to say."

"Well, if your own people are content
with you," said Bessie Alden, laughing,
" it is not for me to complain. But I
shall always think that, properly, you
should have been a great mind — a great
character."

" Ah, that's very theoretic," Lord Lam-
beth declared. " Depend upon it, that's
a Yankee prejudice."

" Happy the country," said Bessie Al-

262

den, " where even people's prejudices are
so elevated !"

" Well, after all," observed Lord Lam-
beth, " I don't know that I am such a
fool as you are trying to make me out."

" I said nothing so rude as that ; but I
must repeat that you are disappointing."

"My dear Miss Alden," exclaimed the
young man, " I am the best fellow in the
world !"

" Ah, if it were not for that !" said
Bessie Alden, with a smile.

Mrs. Westgate had a good many more
friends in London than she pretended,
and before long she had renewed ac-
quaintance with most of them. Their
hospitality was extreme, so that, one
thing leading to another, she began, as
the phrase is, to go out. Bessie Alden,
in this way, saw something of what she
found it a great satisfaction to call to
herself English society. She went to
balls and danced, she went to dinners
and talked, she went to concerts and lis-
tened (at concerts Bessie always listened),
she went to exhibitions and wondered.
Her enjoyment was keen and her curi-
osity insatiable, and, grateful in general
for all her opportunities, she especially

263

prized the privilege of meeting certain
celebrated persons — authors and artists,
philosophers and statesmen — of whose
renown she had been a humble and dis-
tant beholder, and who now, as a part of
the habitual furniture of London draw-
ing-rooms, struck her as stars fallen from
the firmament and become palpable — re-
vealing also sometimes, on contact, quali-
ties not to have been predicted of side-
real bodies.

Bessie, who knew so many of her con-
temporaries by reputation, had a good
many personal disappointments; but, on
the other hand, she had innumerable satis-
factions and enthusiasms, and she com-
municated the emotions of either class to
a dear friend of her own sex in Boston,
with whom she was in voluminous corre-
spondence. Some of her reflections, in-
deed, she attempted to impart to Lord
Lambeth, who came almost every day to
Jones's Hotel, and whom Mrs. Westgate
admitted to be really devoted. Captain
Littledale, it appeared, had gone to India;
and of several others of Mrs. Westgate's
ex-pensioners — gentlemen who, as she
said, had made, in New York, a club-
house of her drawing-room — no tidings

264

were to be obtained ; but Lord Lambeth
was certainly attentive enough to make
up for the accidental absences, the short
memories, all the other irregularities, of
every one else. He drove them in the
park, he took them to visit private collec-
tions of pictures, and, having a house of
his own, invited them to dinner. Mrs.
Westgate, following the fashion of many
of her compatriots, caused herself and
her sister to be presented at the English
court by her diplomatic representative —
for it was in this manner that she alluded
to the American minister to England, in-
quiring what on earth he was put there
for, if not to make the proper arrange-
ments for one's going to a Drawing-room.
Lord Lambeth declared that he hated
Drawing-rooms, but he participated in
the ceremony on the day on which the
two ladies at Jones's Hotel repaired to
Buckingham Palace in a remarkable coach
which his lordship had sent to fetch
them. He had a gorgeous uniform, and
Bessie Alden was particularly struck with
his appearance, especially when on her ask-
ing him — rather foolishly, as she felt — if
he were a loyal subject, he replied that
he was a loyal subject to her. This dec-

265

laration was emphasized by his dancing
with her at a royal ball to which the two
ladies afterwards went, and was not im-
paired by the fact that she thought he
danced very ill. He seemed to her won-
derfully kind ; she asked herself, with
growing vivacity, why he should be so
kind. It was his disposition — that seemed
the natural answer. She had told her
sister that she liked him very much, and
now that she liked him more she won-
dered why. She liked him for his dispo-
sition ; to this question as well that seemed
the natural answer. When once the im-
pressions of London life began to crowd
thickly upon her she completely forgot
her sister's warning about the cynicism
of public opinion. It had given her
great pain at the moment, but there was
no particular reason why she should re-
member it ; it corresponded too little
with any sensible reality ; and it was dis-
agreeable to Bessie to remember disagree-
able things. So she was not haunted
with the sense of a vulgar imputation.
She was not in love with Lord Lambeth
—she assured herself of that.

It will immediately be observed that
when such assurances become necessary

2(!6

the state of a young lady's
affections is already ambigu-
ous ; and, indeed, Bessie Al-
den made no attempt to dissim-
ulate— to herself, of course — a cer-
tain tenderness that she felt for the
young nobleman. She said to her-
self that she liked the type to which
he belonged — the simple, candid,
manly, healthy English tempera-
ment. She spoke to herself of him
as women speak of young men they
like — alluded to his bravery (which
she had never in the least seen test-
ed), to his honesty and gentlemanli-
ness, and was not silent upon the
subject of his good looks. She was
perfectly conscious, moreover, that
she liked to think of his more ad-
ventitious merits ; that her imagi-
nation was excited and gratified
by the sight of a handsome young
man endowed with such large oppor-
tunities— opportunities she hardly

knew for what, but, as she supposed, for
doing great things — for setting an exam-
ple, for exerting an influence, for confer-
ring happiness, for encouraging the arts.
She had a kind of ideal of conduct for a
young man who should find himself in
this magnificent position, and she tried to
adapt it to Lord Lambeth's deportment,
as you might attempt to fit a silhouette in
cut paper upon a shadow projected upon
a wall.

But Bessie Alden's silhouette refused
to coincide with his lordship's image, and
this want of harmony sometimes vexed
her more than she thought reasonable.
When he was absent it was, of course,
less striking; then he seemed to her a
sufficiently graceful combination of high
responsibilities and amiable qualities. But
when he sat there within sight, laughing
and talking with his customary good-
humor and simplicity, she measured it
more accurately, and she felt acutely that
if Lord Lambeth's position was heroic,
there was but little of the hero in the
young man himself. Then her imagi-
nation wandered away from him — very
far away; for it was an incontestable fact
that at such moments he seemed distinct-

ly dull. I am afraid that while Bessie's
imagination was thus invidiously roam-
ing, she cannot have been herself a very
lively companion ; but it may well have
been that these occasional fits of indiffer-
ence seemed to Lord Lambeth a part of
the young girl's personal charm. It had
been a part of this charm from the first
that he felt that she judged him and
measured him more freely and irresponsi-
bly— more at her ease and her leisure, as
it were — than several young ladies with
whom he had been, on the whole, about
as intimate. To feel this, and yet to feel
that she also liked him, was very agree-
able to Lord Lambeth. He fancied he
had compassed that gratification so desir-
able to young men of title and fortune —
being liked for himself. It is true that
a cynical counsellor might have whispered
to him, " Liked for yourself ? Yes ; but
not so very much !" He had, at any
rate, the constant hope of being liked
more.

It may seem, perhaps, a trifle singular
— but it is nevertheless true — that Bessie
Alden, when he struck her as dull, de-
voted some time, on grounds of con-
science, to trying to like him more. I

say on grounds of conscience, because she
felt that he had been extremely " nice "
to her sister, and because she reflected
that it was no more than fair that she
should think as well of him as he thought
of her. This effort was possibly some-
times not so successful as it might have
been, for the result of it was occasionally
a vague irritation, which expressed itself
in hostile criticism of several British in-
stitutions. Bessie Alden went to some
entertainments at which she met Lord
Lambeth; but she went to others at which
his lordship was neither actually nor po-
tentially present ; and it was chiefly on
these latter occasions that she encoun-
tered those literary and artistic celebri-
ties of whom mention has been made.
After a while she reduced the matter to a
principle. If Lord Lambeth should ap-
pear anywhere, it was a symbol that there
would be no poets and philosophers ; and
in consequence — for it was almost a strict
consequence — she used to enumerate to
the young man these objects of her admi-
ration.

"You seem to be awfully fond of those
sort of people," said Lord Lambeth one
day, as if the idea had just occurred to him.

270

"They are the people in England I
am most curious to see," Bessie Alden
replied.

"I suppose that's because you have
read so much," said Lord Lambeth, gal-
lantly.

"I have not read so much. It is be-
cause we think so much of them at home."

" Oh, I see," observed the young noble-
man. " In Boston."

"Not only in Boston ; every where," said
Bessie. " We hold them in great honor ;
they go to the best dinner-parties."

" I dare say you are right. I can't say
I know many of them."

"It's a pity you don't," Bessie Alden
declared. " It would do you good."

" I dare say it would," said Lord Lam-
beth, very humbly. " But I must say I
don't like the looks of some of them."

" Neither do I — of some of them. But
there are all kinds, and many of them
are charming."

" I have talked with two or three of
them," the young man went on, " and I
thought they had a kind of fawning
manner."

"Why should they fawn?" Bessie Al-
den demanded.

271

"I'm sure I don't know. Why, in-
deed ?"

"Perhaps you only thought so," said
Bessie.

"Well, of course," rejoined her com-
panion, " that's a kind of thing that can't
be proved."

"In America they don't fawn," said
Bessie.

"Ah, well, then, they must be better
company."

Bessie was silent a moment. " That is
one of the things I don't like about Eng-
land," she said — " your keeping the dis-
tinguished people apart."

" How do you mean apart ?"

" Why, letting them corne only to cer-
tain places. You never see tlfem."

Lord Lambeth looked at her a moment.
" What people do you mean ?"

"The eminent people — the authors
and artists — the clever people."

" Oh, there are other eminent people
besides those," said Lord Lambeth.

"Well, you certainly keep them apart,"
repeated the young girl.

"And there are other clever people,"
added Lord Lambeth, simply.

Bessie Alden looked at him, and she

272

gave a light laugh. "Not many," she
said.

On another occasion — just after a din-
ner-party,— she told him that there was
something else in England she did not
like.

"Oh, I say!" he cried, "haven't you
abused us enough ?"

"I have never abused you at all," said
Bessie; "but I don't like your prece-
dence"

" It isn't my precedence !" Lord Lam-
beth declared, laughing.

"Yes, it is yours — just exactly yours;
and I think it's odious," said Bessie.

" I never saw such a young lady for

273

discussing tilings ! Has some one had
the impudence to go before you ?" asked
his lordship.

"It is not the going before me that I
object to," said Bessie ; " it is their think-
ing that they have a right to do it — a
right that I recognize"

" I never saw such a young lady as you
are for not ' recognizing.' I have no
doubt the thing is beastly, but it saves
a lot of trouble."

" It makes a lot of trouble. It's horrid,"
said Bessie.

"But how would you have the first
people go ?" asked Lord Lambeth. " They
can't go last."

"Whom do you mean by the first
people ?"

"Ah, if you mean to question first
principles !" said Lord Lambeth.

" If those are your first principles, no
wonder some of your arrangements are
horrid," observed Bessie Alden, with a
very pretty ferocity. "I am a young
girl, so of course I go last ; but imagine
what Kitty must feel on being informed
that she is not at liberty to budge until
certain other ladies have passed out."

" Oh, I say she is not ' informed !' ':

274

cried Lord Lambeth. "No one would
do such a thing as that."

" She is made to feel it," the young
girl insisted — " as if they were afraid she
would make a rush for the door. No;
you have a lovely country," said Bessie
Alden, " but your precedence is horrid."

" I certainly shouldn't think your sister
would like it," rejoined Lord Lambeth,
with even exaggerated gravity. But
Bessie Alden could induce him to enter
no formal protest against this repulsive
custom, which he seemed to think an
extreme convenience.

Percy Beaumont all this time had been
a very much less frequent visitor at
Jones's Hotel than his noble kinsman ;
he had, in fact, called but twice upon the
two American ladies. Lord Lambeth,
who often saw him, reproached him with
his neglect, and declared that, although
Mrs. Westgate had said nothing about it,
he was sure that she was secretly wounded
by it. " She suffers too much to speak,"
said Lord Lambeth.

" That's all gammon," said Percy Beau-
mont; "there's a limit to what people
can suffer !" And, though sending no
apologies to Jones's Hotel, he undertook,

275

in a manner, to explain his absence. "You
are always there," he said, " and that's
reason enough for my not going."

"I don't see why. There is enough
for both of us."

"I don't care to be a witness of your
— your reckless passion," said Percy Beau-
mont.

Lord Lambeth looked at him with a
cold eye, and for a moment said nothing.
" It's not so obvious as you might sup-
pose," he rejoined, dryly, "considering
what a demonstrative beggar I am."

" I don't want to know anything about
it — nothing whatever," said Beaumont.
'Your mother asks me every time she
sees me whether I believe you are really
lost — and Lady Pimlico does the same.
I prefer to be able to answer that I know
nothing about it — that I never go there.
I stay away for consistency's sake. As I
said the other day, they must look after
you themselves."

"You are devilish considerate," said
Lord Lambeth. "They never question
me."

"They are afraid of you. They are
afraid of irritating you and making you
worse. So they go to work very cau-

276

tiously, and, somewhere or other, they
get their information. They know a
great deal about yon. They know that
you have been with those ladies to the
dome of St. Paul's and — where was the
other place ? — to the Thames Tunnel."

" If all their knowledge is as accurate
as that, it must be very valuable," said
Lord Lambeth.

" Well, at any rate, they know that you
have been visiting the i sights of the me-
tropolis.' They think — very naturally,
as it seems to me — that when you take to
visiting the sights of the metropolis with
a little American girl, there is serious
cause for alarm." Lord Lambeth re-
sponded to this intimation by scornful
laughter, and his companion continued,
after a pause : " I said just now I didn't
want to know anything about the affair ;
but I will confess that I am curious to
learn whether you propose to marry Miss
Bessie Alden."

On this point Lord Lambeth gave his
interlocutor no immediate satisfaction ;
he was musing, with a frown. " By
Jove," he said, " they go rather too far !
They shall find me dangerous — I promise
them."

277

Percy Beaumont began to laugh. " You
don't redeem your promises. You said
the other day you would make your
mother call."

Lord Lambeth continued to meditate.
" I asked her to call," he said, simply.

" And she declined ?"

" Yes ; but she shall do it yet."

"Upon my word," said Percy Beau-
mont, " if she gets much more frightened
I believe she will." Lord Lambeth looked
at him, and he went on. " She will go
to the girl herself."

"How do you mean she will go to
her?"

" She will beg her off, or she will bribe
her. She will take strong measures."

Lord Lambeth turned away in silence,
and his companion watched him take
twenty steps and then slowly return. " I
have invited Mrs. Westgate and Miss
Alden to Branches," he said, "and this
evening I shall name a day."

"And shall you invite your mother
and your sisters to meet them ?"

"Explicitly!"

"That will set the duchess off," said
Percy Beaumont. " I suspect she will

278

" She may do as she pleases."

Beaumont looked at Lord Lambeth.
"You do really propose to marry the
little sister, then ?"

" I like the way you talk about it !"
cried the young man. " She won't gob-
ble me down ; don't be afraid."

" She won't leave you on your knees,"
said Percy Beaumont. " What is the in-
ducement ?"

"You talk about proposing : wait till I
have proposed," Lord Lambeth went on.

" That's right, my dear fellow ; think-
about it," said Percy Beaumont.

" She's a charming girl," pursued his
lordship.

" Of course she's a charming girl. I
don't know a girl more charming, intrin-
sically. But there are other charming
girls nearer home."

" I like her spirit," observed Lord Lam-
beth, almost as if he were trying to tor-
ment his cousin.

" What's the peculiarity of her spirit ?"

"She's not afraid, and she says things
out, and she thinks herself as good as
any one. She is the only girl I have
ever seen that was not dying to marry

me."

279

"How do you know that, if you haven't
asked her ?"

" I don't know how ; but 1 know it."

"I am sure she asked me questions
enough about your property and your
titles," said Beaumont.

" She has asked me questions, too ; no
end of them," Lord Lambeth admitted.
"Bat she asked for information, don't
you know."

"Information? Aye, I'll warrant she
wanted it. Depend upon it that she is
dying to marry you just as much and just
as little as all the rest of them."

" I shouldn't like her to refuse me — I
shouldn't like that."

"If the thing would be so disagree-
able, then, both to you and to her, in
Heaven's name leave it alone," said Percy
Beaumont.

Mrs. Westgate, on her side, had plenty
to say to her sister about the rarity of
Mr. Beaumont's visits and the non-ap-
pearance of the Duchess of Bays water.
She professed, however, to derive more
satisfaction from this latter circumstance
than she could have done from the most
lavish attentions on the part of this great
lady. " It is most marked," she said —

280

"most marked. It is a delicious proof
that, we have made them miserable. The
day we dined with Lord Lambeth I was
really sorry for the poor fellow." It will
have been gathered that the entertain-
ment offered Lord Lambeth to his Ameri-
can friends had not been graced by the
presence of his anxious mother. He had
invited several choice spirits to meet
them ; but the ladies of his immediate
family wrere to Mrs. Westgate's sense —
a sense possibly morbidly acute — con-
spicuous by their absence.

" I don't want to express myself in a
manner that you dislike," said Bessie
Alden ; " but I don't know why you
should have so many theories about Lord
Lambeth's poor mother. You know a
great many young men in New York
without knowing their mothers."

Mrs. Westgate looked at her sister, and
then turned away. " My dear Bessie,
you are superb !" she said.

" One thing is certain," the young girl
continued. " If I believed I were a cause
of annoyance — however unwitting — to
Lord Lambeth's family, I should insist —

"Insist upon my leaving England,"
said Mrs. Westgate.

281

"No, not that. I want to go to the
National Gallery again ; I want to see
Stratford - on - Avon and Canterbury Ca-
thedral. But I should insist upon his
coming to see us no more."

" That would be very modest and very
pretty of you ; but you wouldn't do it
now."

"Why do you say 'now?'" asked Bes-
sie Alden. "Have I ceased to be mod-
est ?"

" You care for him too much. A
month ago, when you said you didn't, I
believe it was quite true. But at pres-
ent, my dear child," said Mrs. Westgate,
"you wouldn't find it quite so simple a
matter never to see Lord Lambeth again.
I have seen it coming on."

"You are mistaken," said Bessie. " You
don't understand."

"My dear child, don't be perverse,"
rejoined her sister.

" I know him better, certainly, if you
mean that," said Bessie. "And I like
him very much. But I don't like him
enough to make trouble for him with his
family. However, I don't believe in
that."

" I like the way you say ' however,' ':

Mrs. Westgate exclaimed. " Come ; you
would not marry him ?"

" Oh no," said the young girl.

Mrs. Westgate for a moment seemed
vexed. " Why not, pray ?" she demanded.

" Because I don't care to," said Bessie
Alden.

The morning after Lord Lambeth had
had, with Percy Beaumont, that exchange
of ideas which has just been narrated,
the ladies at Jones's Hotel received from
his lordship a written invitation to pay
their projected visit to Branches Castle
on the following Tuesday. "I think I
have made up a very pleasant party," the
young nobleman said. " Several people
whom you know, and my mother and
sisters, who have so long been regrettably
prevented from making your acquaint-
ance." Bessie Alden lost no time in call-
ing her sister's attention to the injustice
she had done the Duchess of Bayswater,
whose hostility was now proved to be a
vain illusion.

" Wait till you see if she comes," said
Mrs. Westgate. " And if she is to meet
us at her son's house, the obligation was
all the greater for her to call upon us."

Bessie had not to wait long, and it ap-

peared that Lord Lambeth's mother now
accepted Mrs. Westgate's view of her
duties. On the morrow, early in the
afternoon, two cards were brought to the
apartment of the American ladies — one
of them bearing the name of the Duchess
of Bayswater, and the other that of the
Countess of Pirnlico. Mrs. Westgate
glanced at the clock. "It is not yet
four," she said ; " they have come early ;
they wish to see us. We will receive
them." And she gave orders that her
visitors should be admitted. A few mo-
ments later they were introduced, and
there was a solemn exchange of amen-
ities. The duchess was a large lady,
with a fine fresh color ; the Countess of
Pimlico was very pretty and elegant.

The duchess looked about her as she
sat down — looked not especially at Mrs.
Westgate. " I dare say my son has told
you that I have been wanting to come
and see you," she observed.

" You are very kind," said Mrs. West-
gate, vaguely — her conscience not allow-
ing her to assent to this proposition—
and, indeed, not permitting her to enun-
ciate her own with any appreciable em-
phasis.

" He says you were so kind to him in
America," said the duchess.

" We are very glad," Mrs. Westgate re-
plied, " to have been able to make him a
little more — a little less — a little more
comfortable."

" I think that he stayed at your house,"
remarked the Duchess of Bays water,
looking at Bessie Alden.

" A very short time," said Mrs. West-
gate.

"Oh!" said the duchess; and she con-
tinued to look at Bessie, who was en-
gaged in conversation with her daughter.

"Do you like London?" Lady Pim-
lico had asked of Bessie, after looking at
her a good deal — at her face and her
hands, her dress and her hair.

"Very much indeed," said Bessie.

" Do you like this hotel ?"

" It is very comforta-
ble," said Bessie.

" Do you like stopping
at hotels?" inquired
Lady Pimlico, after a
pause.

"I am very fond of
travelling," Bessie an-
swered, "and I suppose

hotels are a necessary part of it. But they
are not the part I am fondest of."

" Oh, I hate travelling," said the Count-
ess of Pimlico, and transferred her atten-
tion to Mrs. Westgate.

" My son tells me you are going to
Branches," the duchess said, presently.

" Lord Lambeth has been so good as to
ask us," said Mrs. Westgate, who per-
ceived that her visitor had now begun to
look at her, and who had her customary
happy consciousness of a distinguished
appearance. The only mitigation of her
felicity on this point was that, having in-
spected her visitor's own costume, she
said to herself, " She won't know how
well I am dressed !"

"He has asked me to go, but I am
not sure I shall be able," murmured the
duchess.

" He had offered us the p — the pros-
pect of meeting you," said Mrs. Westgate.

" I hate the country at this season,"
responded the duchess.

Mrs. Westgate gave a little shrug. " I
think it is pleasanter than London."

But the duchess's eyes were absent
again ; she was looking very fixedly at
Bessie. In a moment she slowly rose,

286

walked to a chair that stood empty at the
young girl's right hand, and silently
seated herself. As she was a majestic,
voluminous woman, this little transaction
had, inevitably, an air of somewhat im-
pressive intention. It diffused a certain
awkwardness, which Lady Pimlico, as a
sympathetic daughter, perhaps desired to
rectify in turning to Mrs. Westgate.

u 1 dare say you go out a great deal,"
she observed.

"No, very little. We are strangers,
and we didn't come here for society."

"I see," said Lady Pimlico. "It's
rather nice in town just now."

" It's charming," said Mrs. Westgate.
" But we only go to see a few people —
whom we like."

" Of course one can't like every one,"
said Lady Pimlico.

" It depends upon one's society," Mrs.
Westgate rejoined.

The duchess meanwhile had addressed
herself to Bessie. " My son tells me the
young ladies in America are so clever."

" I am glad they made so good an im-
pression on him," said Bessie, smiling.

The duchess was not smiling; her
large, fresh face was very tranquil. " He

is very susceptible," she said. "He
thinks every one clever, and sometimes
they are."

" Sometimes," Bessie assented, smiling
still.

The duchess looked at her a little, and
then went on : " Lambeth is very sus-
ceptible, but he is very volatile, too."

" Volatile?" asked Bessie.

" He is very inconstant. It won't do
to depend on him."

"Ah," said Bessie, " I don't recognize
that description. We have depended on
him greatly — my sister and I — and he
has never disappointed us."

" He will disappoint you yet," said the
duchess.

Bessie gave a little laugh, as if she
were amused at the duchess's persistency.
"I suppose it will depend on what we
expect of him."

" The less you expect the better," Lord
Lambeth's mother declared.

" Well," said Bessie, " we expect noth-
ing unreasonable."

The duchess for a moment was silent,
though she appeared to have more to say.
" Lambeth says he has seen so much of
you," she presently began.

288

" He has been to see us very often ; he
has been very kind," said Bessie Alden.

"I dare say you are used to that. I
am told there is a great deal of that in
America."

" A great deal of kindness ?" the young
girl inquired, smiling.

" Is that what you call it ? I know
you have different expressions."

"We certainly don't always under-
stand each other," said Mrs. Westgate,
the termination of whose interview with
Lady Pimlico allowed her to give atten-
tion to their elder visitor.

" I am speaking of the young men
calling so much upon the young ladies,"
the duchess explained.

" But surely in England," said Mrs.
Westgate, "the young ladies don't call
upon the young men ?"

"Some of them do — almost!" Lady
Pimlico declared. " When the young
men are a great parti ."

" Bessie, you must make a note of
that," said Mrs. Westgate. " My sister,"
she added, " is a model traveller. She
writes down all the curious facts she
hears in a little book she keeps for the
purpose."

The duchess was a little flushed ; she
looked all about the room, while her
daughter turned to Bessie. " My brother
told us you were wonderfully clever,"
said Lady Pimlico.

"He should have said my sister," Bessie
answered — "when she says such things
as that."

" Shall you be long at Branches?" the
duchess asked, abruptly, of the young girl.

" Lord Lambeth has asked us for three
days," said Bessie.

"I shall go," the duchess declared,
" and my daughter, too."

" That will be charming !" Bessie re-
joined.

" Delightful !" murmured Mrs. West-
gate.

" I shall expect to see a great deal of
you," the duchess continued. " When I
go- to Branches I monopolize my son's
guests."

" They must be most happy," said Mrs.
Westgate, very graciously.

"I want immensely to see it — to see
the castle," said Bessie to the duchess.
" I have never seen one — in England, at
least ; and you know we have none in
America."

"Ah, you are fond of castles?" in-
quired her Grace.

" Immensely !" replied the young girl.
" It has been the dream of my life to
live in one."

The duchess looked at her a moment,
as if she hardly knew how to take this
assurance, which, from her Grace's point
of view, was either very artless or very
audacious. " Well," she said, rising, " I
will show you Branches myself." And

291

upon this the two great ladies took their
departure.

" What did they mean by it ?" asked
Mrs. Westgate, when they were gone.

" They meant to be polite," said Bessie,
" because we are going to meet them."

"It is too late to be polite," Mrs.
Westgate replied, almost grimly. " They
meant to overawe us by their fine man-
ners and their grandeur, and to make you
lacker prise"

"Lacker prise f What strange things
you say !" murmured Bessie Alden.

" They meant to snub us, so that we
shouldn't dare to go to Branches," Mrs.
Westgate continued.

"On the contrary," said Bessie, "the
duchess offered to show me the place
herself."

"Yes, you may depend upon it she won't
let you out of her sight. She will show
you the place from morning till night."

"You have a theory for everything,"
said Bessie.

"And you apparently have none for
anything."

" I saw no attempt to ' overawe ' us,"
said the young girl. " Their manners
were not fine."

292

"They were not even good!" Mrs.
AVestgate declared.

Bessie was silent a while, but in a
few moments she observed that she had
a very good theory. "They came to
look at me," she said, as if this had been
a very ingenious hypothe-
sis. Mrs. AVestgate did
it justice ; she greet-
ed it with a smile,
and pronounced it
most brilliant, while,
in reality, she felt
that the young girFs
scepticism, or her
charity, or, as she
had sometimes called
it appropriately, her
idealism, was proof against
irony. Bessie, however
remained meditative all the
rest of that day and well on into the
morrow.

On the morrow, before lunch, Mrs.
Westgate had occasion to go out for an
hour, and left her sister writing a letter.
When she came back she met Lord Lam-
beth at the door of the hotel, coming
away. She thought he looked slightly

293

embarrassed ; lie was certainly very grave.
" I am sorry to have missed you. Won't
you come back ?" she asked.

"No," said the young man, "I can't.
I have seen your sister. I can never
come back." Then he looked at her a
moment, and took her hand. " Good-bye,
Mrs. Westgate," he said. " You have
been very kind to me." And with what
she thought a strange, sad look in his
handsome young face, he turned away.

She went in, and she found Bessie still
writing her letter — that is, Mrs. Westgate
perceived she was sitting at the table with
the pen in her hand and not writing.
" Lord Lambeth has been here," said the
elder lady at last.

Then Bessie got up and showed her a
pale, serious face. She bent this face
upon her sister for some time, confessing
silently and a little pleading. u I told
him," she said at last, " that we could not
go to Branches."

Mrs. Westgate displayed just a spark
of irritation. " He might have waited,"
she said, with a smile, " till one had seen
the castle." Later, an hour afterwards,
she said, " Dear Bessie, I wish you might
have accepted him."

294

" I couldn't," said Bessie, 'gently.

" He is an excellent fellow," said
Mrs. Westgate.

" I couldn't," Bessie repeated.

" If it is only," her sister added,
" because those women will think
that they succeeded — that they par-
alyzed us !"

Bessie Alden turned away ; but
presently she added, "They were
interesting ; I should have liked to
see them again."

" So should I !" cried Mrs. West-
gate, significantly.

" And I should have liked to see
the castle," said Bessie. " But now
we must leave England," she added.

Her sister looked at her. " You
will not wait to go to the National
Gallery?"

" Not now."

"Nor to Canterbury Cathedral «"

Bessie reflected a moment. "We
can stop there on our way to Paris,"
she said.

Lord Lambeth did riot tell Percy
Beaumont that the contingency he

.p.

was not prepared at all to like had oc-
curred ; but Percy Beaumont, on hear-
ing that the two ladies had left London,
wondered with some intensity what had
happened — wondered, that is, until the
Duchess of Bayswater came a little to his
assistance. The two ladies went to Paris,
and Mrs. Westgate beguiled the journey
to that city by repeating several times :
" That's what I regret ; they will think
they petrified us." But Bessie Alden
seemed to regret nothing.

I (

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